


Cream

by animal



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst and Humor, Angst with a Happy Ending, Awkward Boners, Ben Solo doesn't know how to human, Ben Solo is naked(TM), Ben is a damn CAT, Ben is obsessed with Rey's tits, Ben is quite literally Rey's pet, Existential Angst, F/M, Fluff and Smut, Is this a Mommy kink, Kitty!Ben, Minor Roux, Praise Kink, Rey is 33, Rey questions her own sanity, Rey works in retail, Shapeshifting, but Ben isn't aware they're awkward, her actual pet, lots of dairy products
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-10
Updated: 2019-09-07
Packaged: 2019-10-25 21:11:34
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 20
Words: 60,072
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17732753
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/animal/pseuds/animal
Summary: After a long day at work, Rey lets a cat inside her apartment.





	1. Teenagers hate on marriage

**Author's Note:**

> This fic should count 15 chapters, hopefully? 30, 40K words? EDIT: yeah right
> 
> Thank you so so much for reading, I hope you enjoy it <3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [(the gorgeous fanart at the beginning of this chapter is by kylorenjen <3)](https://kylorenjen.tumblr.com/post/183495290895/this-piece-was-inspired-by-my-favorite-wip-and-one)

 

 

Rey feels the ice-cold rain down in her bones. She's positively drenched. 

 

All it took was for her to run without an umbrella from her Honda to her building, and she hasn't parked that far. 

 

A cold shower, in the middle of winter: exactly what she needed after a ten-hour shift at  _Peggy's_ , one of the three grocery stores in town.

 

She's used to seeing very few cars on the road past nine PM, when herself is driving through town after having closed the store in her capacity as  _floor manager_. 

 

It never was her ambition to become one, but after ten years of seniority, it had become nearly impossible for her to justify why she was still at the very bottom of the ladder after so many years, especially the eighteen year-olds her boss hires for the summer.

 

When she was twenty she could say that she was saving money to go to college, like them. At thirty, saying that she simply doesn't want the responsabilities that come with a promotion if it's to barely feel the difference money-wise doesn't sound as good and her previous excuses.

 

Not that she owes anyone an explanation. But she simply doesn't have a  _dream job_.

 

Ideally, her dream would be not to work -or rather, not to have a boss.

 

She's not lazy. She can work around the house. Taking care of a home  _is_  work. 

 

But some would argue she wouldn't be useful to society. 

 

So instead, she puts boxes of cereals and cans and beers on the shelves above the right price tags for hours, counts them, lose track of her counting, recount the same row, takes notes for the next order -all while removing the food that has expired and pouring gallons of bleach on it, to be sure no one too hungry will come dig in the trash to retrieve something to eat.

 

 _You know_.

 

To be useful to society.

 

There's nothing to do in this town once the night falls, not much to do before it does either. People go to work, people go home -and that's about it around here. There are no theaters, no big restaurants, no museums, and hardly any bars.

 

And with that kind of weather, the roads are properly  _deserted_.

 

Driving on the outskirt of town in the storm, it feels like she's the last person on earth.

 

She goes really slow, leaning forward on her steering wheel to better see through the windshield when the wipers push the water away.

 

Once out of the car she runs, thankful for her safety shoes, the only reason she doesn't fall head first to the ground with that rain.

 

A moment later she's inside the building, at the bottom of the stairs, vehemently giving the elevator that's been out-of-service for the past six months the finger, when she receives a call.

 

Her hair and her feet are soaked, but at least her anorak has managed to keep the phone dry. 

 

Out-of-breath, she immediately picks up when she sees who's calling. 

 

She's been trying to have Rose on the phone for three weeks -the last time Rey saw her was five months ago at the hospital, when Rose had the twins.

 

"Rose!" She wheezes, taking the stairs, wringing the water out of her hair with one hand, her bag sliding down her shoulder, trying to keep her phone far enough from her face that it doesn't get wet but not too far that she can't hear anything. 

 

"Hey, Rey, I don't really--"

 

The phone slips out of her hand and lands with a weak clatter on the tile.

 

" _Fuck!!_ " she rages, teeth clenched, bending to quickly pick it up before Rose hangs up and Rey doesn't hear from her for another three weeks. 

 

With how dark it is, she can't even check if her phone is completely intact. She hopes so. 

 

"Rose??"

 

A short silence. 

 

"...yeah, Rey, are you listening?"

 

Second floor, almost there.

 

"Yeah, I just--"

 

Rose cuts her off.

 

"I don't really have the time right now, uh, to  _talk_ \--just letting you know that we can't make it tomorrow."

 

Rey comes to a stop in the middle of the stairs. 

 

Catching her breath, she processes the information, unsure how to react.

 

A baby starts crying on the other end of the line. 

 

"Oh," Rey breathes, but she's sure Rose doesn't hear her. 

 

The past two months, she's been sending text after text to Rose and Armie asking them confirmation that they'd be free tomorrow night, to make sure they'd have the time to organize and wouldn't forget about it.

 

Obviously, both of them completely missed the point of a night out  _tomorrow_ , otherwise Rose wouldn't cancel with so little tact.

 

Tomorrow is Rey's thirty-third birthday.

 

"It---would take too long to explain, I'm just calling to let you know real quick and that's it," huffs Rose, presumably while doing something that'd be much easier to do without a phone between her face and her shoulder. "...it's pretty insane over here."

 

"Yeah," Rey's shoulders sag as she resumes walking up the stairs, "---I know."

 

There's another short moment of silence, before she hears Rose mutter: "No. You really don't." 

 

Rey stops just as she's about to turn the key into her door's lock.

" _Uuh.._. okay." 

 

She doesn't know what else to say to that. 

 

"You know what?" Rose asks, ignoring Rey's awkward response, "I'll call you later in the week to reschedule."

 

"...sure," Rey mutters -despite knowing very well that Rose won't.

 

The call ends with rushed  _goodbyes_  not five seconds later.

 

Once inside, Rey turns the light on in the hallway and lets her wet bag fall on her wooden floor.

 

Ever since Rose's last pregnancy, the distance between Rey and her friends has steadily been growing.

 

Come to think of it, maybe that distance was there when they had their first kid, two years ago. Or maybe when they got married two years before that. 

 

Or the night she listened to them talk for fifty minutes straight about what their options were in terms of loan, if they eventually wanted to buy a house together.

 

Rey isn't like that. 

 

She wasn't like that when she was twenty, and she hasn't changed with the years -not even during her six years of relationship with Roy, a colleague of Armie at the firm, who Rose introduces to her on the sole pretext that,  _LOL, you two almost have the same name._

 

That relationship ends a year and a half ago, when Rey stammers "--wh--what?  _Why?_ " instead of saying  _yes_  the night Roy kneels in front of her with a small box in his hand. 

 

As soon as they meet, she lets him know that she doesn't believe in marriage, and that she doesn't want children. 

 

Like most people, though, he's secretly confident that she will change her mind. 

 

And when he finds out that she hasn't, whatever they have instantly falls apart like a house of cards.

 

_"...and feeling the same as you did when you were twenty-five doesn't concern you?"_

 

_"Come on, Rey. Teenagers hate on marriage when they think they're being edgy. I'm thirty-two, just how long do you think we should wait, exactly?"_

 

A week later, he's completely removed from her life. In fact, it's almost like he's never been a part of it at all.  

 

The rain is pouring outside, more so than earlier, and in the silence of her apartment Rey hears the heavy rumble of some distant thunder getting closer.

 

She takes off her safety shoes, curling and uncurling her stiff toes against the parquet.

 

It's alright.

 

She'll take a shower, eat whatever she finds in the fridge if she has any appetite.

Then fall asleep head first and start it all again tomorrow. 

 

She can't wait. 

 

She's shaking from the cold when she takes off her anorak. Arms against her chest, she pads straight to the bathroom further down the hallway. 

 

Her lips are already blue when she catches her reflection in the mirror.  _Jesus_. 

 

She starts undressing, taking her shirt off, then pushes the shower curtain open to turn the water on. 

 

She jumps with a yelp. 

 

On the other side of the small window above the shower head on the wall, two brownish eyes follow her movements. The owner of said eyes doesn't seem as shocked as her.

 

She lets out a loud sigh. 

 

_How did that cat got there?_

  

The animal is completely soaked, curled into a ball against the window, head bowed to avoid the best it can the wind and the hard rain hitting its black fur.

 

She can barely discern the feline's exact form with how dark the sky is behind it, though its eyes stand out pretty well.

 

However it got there, surely it can go down the same way.

 

And it  _should_ , because it doesn't look like the storm is going to clear up any time soon.

 

Not her problem. 

 

She turns the water on, resolute not to pay any more attention to it, shivering when she takes off her pants.

 

 _Also_ , even though she can't exactly esteem how well fed that cat is, it doesn't look stray to her. If it's not stray, it's not her responsability.

 

She does her best not to glance again at the animal when she gets inside the tub, despite knowing that it's probably looking down at her, drowning in the rain while she gets to warm her bones up under the hot stream of her shower---

 

She clenches her jaw.

 

_So what?_

It's  _rain_ , that cat isn't going to die because of a bit of  _rain_. People ought to take better care of their pets.  

 

She rubs the soap between her hands a bit more forcefully than necessary, determined to get this shower over with.

 

God she misses her bed. That day has lasted long enough.

 

Unfortunately for her, a lightning cracks the sky open then-- 

 

-and not two seconds later, the most defeaning thunder ever makes her heart skip a beat as she stiffens, eyes wide. 

 

She turns the water off with sharp sigh, jaw tight. 

 

Looking up, she sees that the cat isn't moving at all, curled in on itself. 

 

The rain still pouring on it. 

 

"Fuck me," she murmurs to no one, rubbing her face with both hands. 

 

The cold wind, and even some rain hit her skin while she holds the window open. 

 

"--thank me later." 

 

The animal hesitates at first, eyes blinking, assessing this new development. 

 

 

It lands inside the tub with a loud thud the next moment. 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [If one day you'd rather / Get a dog on a leash / I'll show you what a cat / Is capable of ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6AN_45QjOLA)


	2. Sleep problems

 

The nighttime has been source of a lot of anxieties for Rey ever since she was a child.

 

She's not as fearful of the night as she used to be, but usually she still has a hard time getting all the rest she needs when she's supposed to get it. 

 

Her relationship with Roy had tempered her sleep problems somewhat -then those problems came back full swing when she had to sleep alone again for the first time in years. 

 

Whatever there is out there that can ruin a good night sleep, she's experienced it.

 

She's had nightmares, vivid ones, recurrent ones; nightmares about not being able to lose the giants chasing her, and nightmares that made her relive the night she spent waiting for her parents to come home.

 

She's had periods of insomnia, waking up at one in the morning and not falling back asleep until five AM, or not falling asleep at all in the first place; sometimes just once a month, and sometimes turning in her bed without finding any comfort several nights in a row.

 

She's sleepwalked a few times, scaring Roy to death when he woke up to her eating raw chicken on the bed, legs crossed in the dark; and she's wet the bed a couple of times too, well into her adult life. 

 

Then, last but not least, she's had serious episodes of sleep paralysis: she'll wake up in her body without being able to move a single finger, lying in her bed, something breathing heavily against her ear; a weight on her chest'll press her down, and she'll watch, terrified as a dark form rests on her, unable to scream herself out of it, forced to push through the two minutes or so that it usually lasts.

 

It hasn't happened a lot, but the few times it did, it kept her on edge for days afterwards -and awake at night too. To this day, it is the one thing she dreads the most, and there's no solution for it. 

 

In short, she doesn't get the sleep she needs, and living alone doesn't make things easier -but at this point, she's over it. Sort of. 

 

For some reason, her  _sleep problems_  are what's on her mind when she lets the cat jump inside her home.

 

As soon as Rey closes the window, small chunks of hail hit the glass -then the roof above her immediately after. 

 

The wind howls around the building, shaking the world outside the walls of her apartment.

 

Protectiveness swells in her chest despite her previous reluctance, and she turns around to get a good look at the cat as it peers back up at her with a blasé, defeated stare, its black fur and its whiskers heavy with rain, dripping on the faience -its wide, prominent ears endearingly drooping to polish the general sullen vibe it's going for. 

 

Now she can actually fully appreciate how fucking huge that cat is. 

 

Shit.  

 

It's not  _fat_ , as far as she can tell, just a  _big_  cat. She doesn't recall ever seeing one so big. 

 

She gets a confirmation of how particularly big it is when she picks it up to get it out of the tub, groaning at its weight -its cold, wet fur chilling the hot skin of her bare chest. 

No way in hell this is a stray cat. Holy shit.

 

It's heavy. 

 

She wouldn't be surprised if it weighted twenty pounds. 

 

Not to mention, a stray cat wouldn't let anyone approach it and move it around like that. 

 

She expects some resistance when she reaches for it, or a reaction at least -but the cat just goes limp in her arms, its back legs passively hanging, body stretching along her own. 

 

She lets it down on the tile and swiftly closes the shower curtain, finally turning the water back on and washing herself with a serene mind this time knowing the cat is inside. 

 

When she opens the curtain back, she sees that her guest sat in the corner near the door, leaning against the wall to give its fur lazy licks in an attempt to clean it from the rain.

 

The animal is clearly discouraged. It vaguely glances at her when she steps out of the tub.

 

Once she put on her pajama bottoms, a sweater and her robe, she pulls a clean towel out of the cupboard under the sink. 

 

"Come here---" is the only warning she gives the cat, before she crouches in front of it to give its fur good, serious rubs, jerking it back and forth in the process. The cat interrupts its licking and waits for her to be done with her nonsense.

 

When she thinks she can't dry it any more than that, she throws the towel aside and quickly lifts the cat's tail up, looking underneath. 

 

Once more the animal lets her, but not without a mean side-eye this time. 

 

"Your balls are still there.  _Great_ ," she comments, letting go of the tail and looking at it in the eyes, "...does it mean you're gonna piss everywhere?"

 

It took her  _two minutes_  to start talking to it.

 

Not alarming at all.

 

The cat, naturally, doesn't answer. It just tiredly blinks at her. 

 

Its fur is so thick, she has to run her fingers around its neck to be sure if there isn't a thin collar hidden in there -but no. Then, she checks the inside of its ears to see if she finds any tattoo -and she finds none.  

  

The cat actually  _sighs_ through its nose. 

 

Tired with her already?

 

"Don't worry," she quietly assures it, standing up, "I'll let you out as soon as the storm ends."

 

Even if it could understand her, it doesn't appear to care at all about its fate.

 

Not about what happens now, not about what'll happen later. 

 

She opens the door, then gently taps on her thigh with a tilt of her head to get it to follow her: 

 

"Come," she whispers, taking two steps toward the kitchen. "Kitty, come here."

 

It looks at her with a bored expression, but eventually raises on its legs and slowly follows her.

 

She takes out a small bowl to fill it with water -putting it down on the tile before beckoning the cat again. 

 

"Here."

 

She has its attention this time, if its tail standing straight as it trots toward her is anything to go by. 

 

She eats a box of cold noodles, her leftovers of the previous night, her hip against the counter, watching the animal drink the water with delicate wet sounds.

 

She's a bit confused as to why knowing the cat is inside, safe with her, makes  _her_  feel safe as well, but it does. 

 

Only when it's done drinking does she realize she doesn't have anything to eat to give it. Not that it appears to be starving, but...

 

She doesn't have any tuna or meat, and she certainly doesn't have any cat food. 

 

Looking inside her fridge she sees the small jar of _crème fraîche_  she was keeping with the ambition of making herself a pumpkin pie. 

 

"Yeah...," she mutters to no one, grabbing the jar, "that's not happening."

 

She glances down at the cat. It's quiet, sitting right by her, looking up at her. 

 

"You're being such a good boy," she opens the jar, crouching in front of it, asking as she dips the tip of her finger in the jar before presenting it to the feline: "...is that of any interest to you?"  

 

The cat doesn't seem too curious at first but rather suspicious, sniffing her finger once or twice before its eyes go as round as can be.

 

It licks her finger clean in the blink of an eye, purring all it can and soon bracing itself on her knee to get more as she holds the jar above her head, trying to dip her finger without letting the cat stick its tongue directly in the jar. 

 

" _Chill_ , son... Jesus."

 

She repeats the process a few times, before thinking better of it and standing to get a blue teacup saucer out of the cupboard and put some cream on it. Meanwhile, the cat bumps its head against her calves, purring everything it knows, rubbing the side of its neck against her feet before it apparently decides that it's waited long enough and jumps on the counter.  

 

It almost looks like the cream goes everywhere but in the cat's mouth. It's on its snout, lips, chin, whiskers -it would roll itself in the cream if it could. Each lick pushes the saucer a bit away. So she holds it in place, while digging the nails of her other hand in the cat's fur, scratching around its head, then further down its back.

 

When the saucer is clean, the cat licks its lips and its paws with dreamy eyes. 

 

Time to call it a day.

 

"...'kay, goodnight," she mumbles, turning away and heading to her bedroom. 

 

Although she hears a thud behind her, she doesn't pay attention to it, and closes the bedroom door. 

 

The moment she pulls the covers up to her chin and turns the light off, a series of faint, unfamiliar sounds get her to still for several seconds -until everything is silent again.

 

However unfamiliar, she can tell that those are the sounds of a cat on its back legs, pedaling against the door to get the human to open.

 

She sighs loudly.

 

Opening the door this time she leaves it that way, without bothering to wait and see if the cat enters or not, too impatient to return to her bed and lie back down. 

 

Back under the covers, lying on her side with her legs folded, she watches from the corner of her eye in the dark, and listens attentively, trying to guess where the cat is and what it's doing.

 

The mattress dips very lightly with a soft sound. 

 

She can't see anything, but she senses how it timidly approaches her, purring faintly, until she finally feels it nestle right against the back of her thighs through the covers. 

 

Then, it's like falling into a coma -a sound, dreamless sleep from which she wakes just once, later on in the middle of the night, for a very brief moment. 

 

Just enough time to see that she rolled on her back, and that the cat is spread on her front, its head right at the base of her neck, rising and falling to the rhythm of her breathing, warm and heavy on her chest and her belly.  

 

She can't explain it, but instead of smothering her, the weight anchors her. 

 

Instead of distressing her, it sends her right back to sleep. 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [I call it magic when I'm with you / And I just got broken, broken into two / Still I call it magic, when I'm next to you](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1PvBc2TOpE4)


	3. A touching demonstration of trust

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey Babies, hope you enjoy 
> 
> Thank you so much for reading <3

 

Rey's alarm goes off at six AM, and she's never hated it as much as she does now, waking up from a night so restorative. 

 

She feels like a newborn being dragged out of the warmest womb, blinking and disoriented, ready to cry at the thought of going out in the cold and being ignored for hours when she says  _Hello_  and  _Have a good day_  to customers.

 

The perspective never rejoices her, but today she'd say pushing through those first minutes to dress up and go to work is particularly painful. 

 

The position she finds the cat in, however, mends her heart and makes her snort. 

 

Belly up, head craned back, his back arched and his legs in the air, once could think he's dead, if his belly wasn't peacefully rising and falling.

 

What a touching demonstration of trust. 

 

Right then, though, her smile vanishes. 

 

Because she can't keep a pet. She can't afford it, and it wouldn't reasonable, not to mention this one definitely belongs to someone. 

 

And how sad must her life be, that she got attached to a stray cat that fast? 

 

Yet the storm has stopped during the night, leaving a fresh crispy air behind, and when she steps out of the apartment, the cat, innocent and unsuspecting, follows her -and she locks the front door behind them both, a pang in her chest. 

 

The sweetheart dutifully trots by her side all the way out of the building and then to her car, nearly making her trip over him when he inadvertently sways in his haste, eager to follow her wherever--

 

\--only to have the car door slammed in his face a minute later, when she has to make sure he doesn't follow her inside the car.

 

She thinks speeding away without a second thought will make it better, that the faster away from the animal she'll be the sooner she'll recover from the spell she's under. 

 

Instead, she spends her entire day worrying, unable to focus on her work, feeling like shit, her heart breaking over and over at the thought of him flinching away when she slammed the door before being left there alone, hurt and confused---

 

Which is just plain  _stupid_ , because that cat probably actually doesn't give that many fucks about her leaving -but no matter how many times she tries to reason herself, her concern and her guilt eat away at her the whole day, making her anticipate what is sure to be  _the best night of her life_  -turning around in her bed, anxious over the well-being of a cat she spent less than ten hours with. 

 

She can't wait. 

 

A day at work, especially in retail, can be its own kind of torture in the first place. Rey lets habits take over and numb her mind, while her interactions with the customers and the repetition in every task suck the life out of her --all until she can finally go home and use whatever amount of energy she's got left to drool in front of a T.V. 

 

The whole time she's at work she compulsively glances at the clock until she can't look at it anymore, dying a little more inside every time she wrongly estimates how much time has passed, waiting for the end of the shift before she even clocks in, then waiting all week for the week-end to arrive -basically spending her life,  _wasting_  her life away  _waiting_  for the few moments where she'll be allowed to just exist, gaping at how her free time, in contrast, flies at an outrageous speed while her body, older than it should be, struggles and often fails to catch up.

 

That day, waiting for the end of her shift would have already been an unsually shitty experience since it's her birthday and that she knows she'll spend it alone. 

Her embarrassing and sudden affection for that stray cat makes it worse. 

 

She's not impatient to go home at all.

 

The night falls eventually, though, and eventually she  _does_  have to drive home. 

She might just throw away the rest of the  _crème fraîche._

 

In retrospect, she knows why she went straight to the bathroom as soon as she passed the door of her apartment, before even taking her safety shoes off -but at that moment, she's sure that she just desperately needs a shower. 

 

Whatever her intentions really are, and whether or not she's aware of them deep down, she's genuinely surprised when she opens the shower curtain and look up at the window.

 

Then, she feels immediately  _overwhelmed_  -- _all because a stray cat is on the other side._

 

He hasn't noticed her presence yet, his head turned the other way, his body in a  _cat loaf_  position until she touches the handle to open the window; he hears her then and jumps a little, eyes wide, before precipitously letting himself inside the second he can. 

 

Once in the tub, he jumps out and runs further inside the apartment, away from the window, as if she'd just open it by mistake and not to  _expressly_  let him in. 

 

" _Baby_ ," she hears herself call him. 

 

She's truly gone. 

 

When he sees that she won't try to get him out, he forgets all about what happened. In the kitchen, while she heats up her leftovers in the microwave, he dedicatedly rubs his neck and his face against her bare feet, rolling on them with a contented purr.

 

She can't resist the urge to crouch and pet him with quiet  _sweeties_  and  _my loves._

 

They have dinner together, her eating her pasta sitting on the counter, watching him lap at the rest of the  _crème fraîche_  right next to her. 

 

She has to pay attention not to unintentionally hurt him while walking from one room to the next, because he's determined to stay under her feet, following her everywhere she goes -until she walks in direction to the bedroom and that this time, he outpaces her, hurrying inside and hopping on the bed before she's even walked in. 

 

She falls asleep on her side, with a fulfilled-looking cat patiently pressing and kneading her belly with his paws, purring her to sleep.

 

It took a single night for them to behave like they've always been life partners.

If only it was that simple with people. 

 

When she has to leave for work the next day, he gleefully follows her until he realizes she's going to the front door and suddenly slows down, hesitant, wary.

 

With a lump in her throat, she picks him up to get him to leave the building with her, feeling him go rigid in her arms, his head low.

 

Once outside, she lets him down. He doesn't look at her, his tail and his head low like he's being punished, but he still follows her to her car albeit a few feet behind her, slowing down on the sidewalk before she reaches the car.

 

He stops there and sits. 

Watching as she leaves. 

 

Needless to say she has very little patience for anyone at work, her stomach in knots, and she closes the store faster than she ever did at the end of the day.

 

Entering her apartment thirty minutes later, she drops her purse on the ground and rushes to the bathroom, not even trying to act like she's cool. 

 

She doesn't fully realize how badly she wanted to find him on the other side of that window until she actually sees him there, waiting for her. 

 

An hour later, he's on her lap on the couch, purring so loudly she almost has trouble hearing everything that's being said on T.V. -not that she actually pays much attention to what happens on the screen anyway, busy as she is digging her nails in the cat's fur, running her hand on his chest when he rolls on his side with a sigh.

 

The next morning, she doesn't think much of it when she wakes up without the cat snuggled against her. 

 

She gets up in a haze, and totters to the bathroom to get ready. 

 

A mug of tea later, fully dressed and her teeth brushed, she starts glancing around, before actively searching for him through the apartment, calling him. 

 

"Kitty, come here... Where are you boy?"

 

She checks under the bed, in the tub, in the wardrobe, looking for him everywhere in every room, but she can't find him ---until she checks under the dresser in the hallway. 

 

She nearly misses his shiny eyes with how dark it is under there.

 

But he's there, looking at her distrustfully, almost defiant, pushing himself against the wall behind him.

 

She sighs. 

 

"Alright."

 

 

She locks the door behind her a minute later -leaving him inside.  

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Home, is where I want to be / But I guess I'm already there / I come home, she lifted up her wings / I guess that this must be the place / I can't tell one from the other / I find you, or you find me? / I'm just an animal looking for a home and / Share the same space for a minute or two / And you love me till my heart stops / Love me till I'm dead](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o9gK2fOq4MY)
> 
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> I won't have internet until Saturday -see you then? ^^


	4. A living dream

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> where are my cat lovers at  
> =D

 

A month and a half goes by without the slightest incident happening. Rey's new life with the cat is a living dream.

 

She doesn't spend as much money on him as she thought she would -and she could even spend less if she wanted to, but one thing she learns about herself pretty early on is that she's a weak mortal and absolutely cannot resist spoiling him. 

 

She's not the type to do things halfway. 

 

The very first day she lets the cat inside her apartment while at work, she comes back with a litter box she bought during her lunch break -one that looks too small for the cat's size- cat food, a few cans of tuna, and of course, against her better judgment,  _crème fraîche_ , that she initially plans on saving for when he's being a  _good boy_. 

 

She has very low standards, as it turns out, because she constantly offers some to him, even before he's done anything to deserve it.

 

Her  _boy_ ,  _baby_ ,  _sweetie_ ,  _love_ ,  _kitty_  follows her everywhere, at all time, from the second she steps into the apartment to the moment she leaves.

 

In the kitchen, the bedroom, in the room that was supposed to be an office and that she's been using instead as a storeroom -he's right behind her, trotting.

 

She once closes the bathroom door behind her to take a shower, and spends half her time rolling her eyes at the scratching sounds against the door, waiting for him to give up, before giving up herself and opening the damn door. 

 

She very soon takes the habit of never closing any door. 

 

She can't lie on the couch or sit at her kitchen table anymore without him snuggling on top of her, on her lap or on her chest, purring her numb, or without him lying on her feet when they're bare, as he's committed to keeping them warm.

 

Aside from getting him to use the litter box -although putting him inside it still earns her a bored scowl- she fails to establish any rule.

 

The first few times he jumps on the counter, she gently pushes him off it with the back of her hand, trying to break a habit that is formed in less than three days, but he immediately jumps right back on it as if nothing happened, blatantly undermining her authority with determined, vigorous purrs.

 

Her pet cat is a complete brat.

 

She calls him that sometimes, although never when he's being one, and almost always with a tone that clearly suggests she doesn't mind him being a brat at all. 

 

Thank God nobody from work sees her like this. 

 

Every night he runs to her, and she opens her arms to him, crouching with a sigh: " _Baby!_  --Mommy missed you so much."

 

Despite all the disgusting love she dumps on him, she discovers and gets confirmation several times that he remains insecure about her decision to keep him for good, when even after a month spent in her home he reacts to her opening the window of the storeroom to air it by immediately leaving her side and exiting the room ---seemingly afraid she'll try to force him out and drop him on the fire escape.

 

He treats the front door with the same distrust every time she leaves and stays away from it -only running to it when she comes back home from work. 

 

It seems nothing can be a threat to her newfound domestic bliss ---until she comes home one Wednesday night to a plain, small, innocent-looking glass at the center of her kitchen table, and the near empty glass milk bottle right next to it.  

 

She stops right where she is, a few feet from the table, the cooing she was addressing the cat instantly dying on her lips.

 

Her  _baby_  keeps attacking her calves with purrs and bumps of his head, unperturbed, while she tries to process what she's staring at.

 

She feels slightly paralyzed then, eyes rapidly going over what she can see of her apartment from where she's standing, holding her breath to see if she can hear anything suspicious -but all she hears are the anxious beating of her heart and the low, delicate hums of the cat at her feet.

 

Passed the initial dread and confusion, comes the -not so successful- rationalizing. She first tries to remember if she drank any milk before leaving for work, and she doesn't -she doesn't remember anything like that, even when trying hard to.

 

If she  _did_  actually drink milk and  _doesn't_  remember doing it, which appears to be the best case scenario here, this is alarming, to say the least. Unless, best version of the worst case scenario, she  _sleepwalked,_ which isn't good news either -and it means that she has to just accept the implication that she woke up this morning, got dressed and had her tea... all without noticing the glass and the bottle of milk  _at the center of her kitchen table?_

 

And this is all without taking into account that she  _never drinks milk like this_ , and also that here, almost the  _entirety of the bottle is gone_.

 

She always keeps a few bottles in advance that she places at the top of the fridge in case she needs some for a recipe -not to drink half of it because she's thirsty.

 

She  _must_  have sleepwalked. But then, again: she didn't notice the glass and the bottle this morning? Was her head so far up her ass that she didn't?

 

The thing is, imagining that someone broke in without damaging or stealing anything, just to drink almost an entire bottle of milk definitely tops her previous hypothesis in terms of absurdity. It's also  _impossible_.

 

Other than her landlady, no one has the key to this apartment -and she knows for a fact her landlady is in Canada, at least for another year.

Again, assuming she would enter her tenant's apartment to _drink their milk_.

 

She finally approaches the table, the cat on her heels, and takes the bottle in hand. The milk inside is warm, and she walks over to the sink to pour it. Then, she washes the glass. 

While the cat is on the counter eating his tuna, she pets him and her heart isn't completely in it. Too distracted.

 

Thanks to the cat's head buried against her side, she still falls asleep without too much trouble two hours later.

 

The incident sure disturbs her, but she only  _loses it_  when she believes she's  _actually_  losing it, coming home from work two days later, when she finds  _another half empty bottle of milk_ on her kitchen table, along with a mug next to it.

 

Once more, she doesn't remember drinking any milk.

 

She sits down. Her heart beating loud. 

 

It takes her ten minutes to check the entire apartment. 

 

The latent terror in her chest hardly allowing her to breathe, she goes into every room and opens the closets, the wardrobe, the shower curtain, looks under the bed; she checks the locks on her door then every window -and  _then_ , she checks everything a second time, and then a third.

 

All along, the cat is following her, confused but dutifully not leaving her side, his tail in the air as if this was all a game.

 

But she finds no one, and she finds nothing.

 

So she's officially becoming crazy. 

 

Sitting down on her couch in the silence of her apartment, letting the cat settle on her lap, she finally starts considering setting a camera somewhere.

 

But the more she thinks about it -about what camera to use and where to hide it- the more she thinks about the practicality of it.

 

She'd need an actual security camera, one that can record for hours, and in the dark.

 

Because those devices are not the type people lend each other, it means that she'd probably have to buy one, and she highly doubts she can afford it -especially if it's to buy something she might use just once.

 

She also wouldn't be too comfortable explaining to anyone why she needs one.

 

The police, of course, isn't an option as long as she's not sure she's not the one drinking the milk. 

 

This time, she doesn't calm down as easily as she did two days before. 

 

And the cat notices. 

 

After her shower, trying to distract herself by watching the T.V., she sits on the couch and not a second later the sweet boy is on her lap, charitably kneading her belly, bumping his head under her chin and rubbing his neck against hers. 

 

Twenty minutes later, she turns the T.V. off, gathers the cat against her chest and carries him to the bedroom. 

 

The animal doesn't protest.

 

Without letting go of him, she buries herself under the covers and lies on her back under him, trying to relax to his purring as he shifts to better snuggle against her, his head right under her chin.

 

She doesn't fall asleep as fast as she has with him so far, but still way faster than how she used to before. 

 

And her sleep is as deep as it gets.

 

\---well into the night, though, she wakes up. 

 

She's just vaguely aware she woke up at first.

 

Her eyes don't open, and her legs just feebly stretch, her toes spreading under the covers as she softly grunts. 

 

Her circumstances, then, are almost in every way those of an episode of sleep paralysis -and also not at all. 

 

It's the middle of the night; she's awake, but not quite; she feels like she can't really move, and the weight on her chest, on her belly, and on her shoulder and her thigh too is there, hot and solid, holding her down -except that she doesn't feel trapped, and she doesn't feel powerless. 

 

She's pacified, breathing to the rhythm of warm and quiet exhales she feels on the base of her neck.

 

Her nails lightly graze the scalp under her left hand near her shoulder, her fingers buried under locks of soft hair.

 

Her eyes open very slowly to stare at the dark. Her hand stills. 

 

She remains like that, her breathing still quiet but getting slightly more uneven, heart beating hard against her ribs. 

 

Not making a sound, she reaches with that same hand for the light switch of her bedside lamp. 

 

When she finds it, she flips it. 

 

Warm light spreads across the room. 

 

She immediately closes her eyes because of the sudden change of luminosity -then progressively blinks them open, squinting at the ceiling. 

 

Her chest stutters when, looking down at herself, her eyes fall on the top of a dark head of hair on her right shoulder, and the pale skin of a thick, heavy arm across her. The covers hide the rest. 

 

A large hand absently palms her left breast through her shirt, pressing gently. 

 

She doesn't move a single muscle. 

 

With just a faint grunt as warning, the head suddenly leaves her shoulder, and two eyes behind the black hair falling across them squint right into her wide open ones, the face they belong to mere inches from hers. 

 

Soft lips press into a thin line, before the whole body over her own shifts under the covers, neck straining toward the old alarm clock near her bedside lamp and her phone.  

 

The same eyes that were staring right at her check the clock with heavy eyelids -before an uncompromising hand seizes the light switch and flips it, turning the light back off. 

 

She lets out a small, quiet whimper when she's pulled further into the warmth of a chest, arms closing around her.

 

A low voice mumbles against her hair.

 

"Go back to sleep, it's not time yet." 

 

Her eyes are closed the next moment. 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Wise men say / Only fools rush in / But I can't help / Falling in love with you](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vGJTaP6anOU)


	5. Can people become crazy because of too much solitude?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> People give [spotsnstripes](https://twitter.com/spotsnstripes1/status/1098052781233950725) the love she deserves for making the gorgeous moodboard at the beginning of this chapter. Thank you SO MUCH, it's just perfect.

 

 

 

Rey wakes up before the alarm of her phone goes off. 

 

For two long minutes, she acts just like she would any morning. 

 

She rolls on her side, extends her hand to find the cat sprawled on the covers and languidly runs her hand back and forth along his body, gently scratching the fur in the crook of his neck while his purring grows louder. 

 

After two minutes of this though, her eyes open, and she sits up. 

 

Because now she remembers the feel of a hand tenderly groping her. 

 

A waking dream, or a very detailed hallucination since she's had some a few times before during her sleep paralysis episodes -she doesn't care to know which one it was, because either way, the issue is the same: for a moment there, she really thought she was done with sleep-related problems.

 

And now strange things happen that suggest she in fact  _still_  sleepwalks, and is  _still_  prone to have sleep paralysis episodes -or at least vivid-ass dreams. 

 

Those would be an upgrade from vivid  _nightmares_ , to be sure, but although what happened this time didn't leave her in complete distress, it felt uncanny enough that her heart beats a bit faster just thinking about it. 

 

She sighs, rubbing her face with both hands. 

 

 _God_  she's tired with herself. 

 

The cat raises his head and twists toward her, half asleep still. 

 

She drags herself out of bed, leaving him there, although she knows without looking back that he's up and following her before she passes the doorway. 

 

In the bathroom, she stares at him while brushing her teeth. Or rather, she stares at his ears.

 

He's sitting three feet away from her, slow-blinking up at her. 

 

The faint, patchy memory of an equally wide ear poking through locks of dark hair comes to her mind. 

 

She spits in the sink, rinses her mouth and her toothbrush, then leans against the wall her eyes back on the cat, drying her mouth with a towel. 

 

He lazily walks to her to bump her leg with his head, prompting her to pick him up as she mumbles:

 

"I'm a thirty-three year old woman who's so obsessed with her cat she imagines him turning into a man. Pray for me."

 

She plants several soft kisses on his ears before letting him down. 

 

As she's about to leave the apartment, she eyes the table in the kitchen, then the two bottles of milk above the fridge for a few seconds -before grabbing them and shoving them into her bag.

 

She  _knows_  that no one broke into her home, but she can't help it -she desperately needs to go home to a normal life tonight, so as an absurd precaution, she takes the milk with her. 

 

Later on she faces her colleagues with a tired smile like she would any other day -feeling strange to be acting like everything is normal while her life at home is anything but.

 

Having to talk about anything other than the glass on her kitchen table and the man she remembers lying on top of her feels strange, but mentioning it isn't an option. It'd sound crazy to her own ears. 

 

So instead, she carefully keeps the two bottles of milk hidden in her locker to avoid lying to whoever sees them.

 

Although there's simply no evidence that her apartment was broken into, she keeps thinking now and then about going to the police as a distant, last option -and every time she does, her imaginary visit at the imaginary police station ends up with her being brought by force to the imaginary psych ward. 

 

Whether that's a probable outcome or not, she's not willing to take the risk, not even because being committed against her will could surely be a traumatic experience, but because ---who would feed the cat while she'd be away? 

 

And if someone dropped by to feed him once in a while, how many days or weeks would her baby spend alone, wondering why she abandoned him?

 

Just the thought makes her impatient to be home as soon as she can and hold the animal safe against her chest until the pace of her heart is normal again.

 

To calm her anxiety at the mere thought of a separation, she buys him  _treats_  -liquid fat cream, some  _chèvre_ that she knows he likes since that time he stole some from her plate, and some salmon. 

 

If nobody sees her give her cat salmon, nobody can judge her. 

 

Like every other night he welcomes her like she is his savior, throwing himself at her and assailing her feet with purrs while she tries her best to walk without kicking him. 

 

Although she knows it's technically impossible she'll found a bottle of milk on the table, she realizes some part of her still expects it when her shoulders relax at once the moment she gets to see the table is still cleared. 

 

The events of the past three days have left her wary of the night again, and she can't help but imagine during the drive home that something strange will happen. 

 

Once she's showered and in her pajamas, though, she's finally forgets about it because someone claims her whole attention. 

 

The cat enthusiastically accepts being rewarded with food for just existing, rolling himself on her when she sits on the couch with everything they need for their meal together. She doesn't bother taking a blanket with her -like every other night, he'll be her personal hot-water bottle, curled on her belly or on her lap depending on her position. 

 

The T.V. throws blue, dancing lights on them as they settle. He's done eating way before she is and spends a few minutes subserviently licking her fingers clean of any smell that isn't his. 

 

When she struggles to keep her eyes open, nearly two hours later, she sits up and unceremoniously uncurls the cat off her stomach to carry him to the bedroom, her slippers slapping the wooden floor, the animal letting her move and manipulate him like a rag doll without a complaint.  

 

She drops him on the bed, then throws the covers over him, joining him the next moment to lie on her side and let him snuggle any way he wants. 

 

She falls asleep instantly, but what feels like ten minutes later, her eyes blink open when she hears a faint sound coming from the living-room.

 

She immediately thinks about the cat, her hand finding him right against her. She's still on her side, and he's facing away from her, peacefully sleeping. 

 

The door silently opens, and Rey lifts her head to see better, but the light from the hallway makes her squint her eyes. 

 

"...Rose?" she murmurs. 

 

Rose is in the doorway, a twin asleep in each arm, and she pads around the bed without a sound to get closer to Rey, who frowns, still lying on her side, looking up at her. 

 

"Jesus Christ, Rey," Rose whispers, her eyes on the cat sleeping in the bed. "...you can't keep him, he's too big."

 

Rey blinks and whispers a confused  _what_  back at her friend.

 

...how did she get in? 

 

But Rose ignores her: "Where does he come from?"

 

Rey defensively puts an arm over the cat. "What do you mean?"

 

"I mean  _where did you find him_ , Rey."

 

Rose silently waits for a reply, right next to the bed in the dark, and Rey hesitates before eventually mumbling low: "...I think he lived on the street--"

 

"The  _street_?" Rose shakes her head, appalled, and whispers again: "--Rey,  _come on_."

 

Rey protectively pulls the cat to her, with care, not knowing what to say; it doesn't matter, Rose is not finished. 

 

"...and stop calling him  _baby_ , he's not a baby," she whispers, motioning with her chin toward the heads of her two children. " _These_ are actual babies."

 

Rey pouts: "People call their pet cats  _baby_ , sometimes, it's not just me."

 

She watches as Rose has a small double take, before she narrows her eyes, an eyebrow quirked, wincing as if Rey had just said the most absurd thing ever. 

 

"... _what?_  ---what  _cat_  are you talking about??"

 

Rey looks down next to her with the intent of pointing at the obvious-- 

 

\---but before she can do that, the sight of a pale skin, a large chest and dark hair is what jolts her awake for good. 

 

Eyes open in the dark, she holds in a sigh of relief for a few seconds, making certain glancing around that Rose is in fact not here, and the light in the hallway is off - _yes_ , it was just a dream. 

 

" _God_ ," she quietly huffs in the silence of the room, letting her head back down on the pillow. 

 

Still sleepy, she squirms back under the covers, closing her eyes and rolling back on her side, her arm circling the warm, large body in front of her and spooning it until it's flushed against her chest and hips, her hands absently running over heated skin, her cold nose finding shelter at the nape of the head of hair she shares the pillow with.

 

\---her whole body  _jolts_  in alarm when her drowsy brain finally gets the memo, sending her rolling out of the bed and falling to the ground with a loud thud.

 

She's faintly aware of movements under the covers as she grunts, rising, her eyes wide, breathing heavy -before she immediately  _exits_ the room and rushes in direction to the bathroom, shocked and very unsure what's real and what isn't. 

 

Head in the sink she lets the cold water run on her head for a moment, gasping and groaning -then raises her head to look at her reflection in the mirror, shaken. 

 

What is happening to her. What is happening. Why does she keep imagining a man is in her bed.  _Is she imagining it? Is he a one night stand, and she instead imagined she was with the cat? When has she ever done one night stands? What's real, and what isn't?_

 

Her reflection stares back at her with no answer.  

 

When she turns the water off, she holds her breath -her head tilting at the sound of faint footsteps getting closer in the hallway. 

 

She stares in the mirror at the door she left ajar behind her. 

 

There's no way for her to be prepared anyway. No amount of cold water or drum rolls can have her brace herself enough. She just stares, slightly leaned forward over the sink with her face and half her hair wet, her heart clearly trying to indicate to her that she's in a situation never listed in any part of her brain. What should she do? What do people do in a situation like this? 

 

...when has a situation like this one ever happened? 

 

With no precedent, she just freezes. 

 

The steps slow down right behind the door, before it opens wide without the smallest creak.

 

It's the first time she sees him standing and not lying down.

 

She knew, from her dreams or whatever it was, or even from how the wooden floor sounded under his weight, that a big man was approaching, but  _now_  she can actually see exactly how tall he is. The amount of pale skin under the weak light of the ceiling just make his size more imposing.

 

He's big, and if she ever wanted to, say, run for her life, he's in the way. 

 

She's trying really hard to act like she's not terrified. 

 

He stays in the doorway for a moment, blinking sleepily at her through the unruly curls of his hair, a large ear poking through them on one side, lips made fuller for their slight pout until he speaks with the same low, casual voice he used before:

 

"It's, it's not---it's not time, yet."

 

His mild confusion disorients her even more if possible. 

 

 _"Time for what?"_  she croaks at his reflection in the mirror. 

 

He steps closer, visibly bored, stopping slightly behind her and by her side.

 

She goes perfectly immobile, playing dead like a mouse. 

 

"... _time to get up_ ," he mumbles. "It's the middle of the night." 

 

While he's distractedly looking down at the sink, her eyes don't leave him -she refuses to turn her head to directly look at him in the flesh, warm and breathing beside her, feeling like she's only able to handle his reflection. Yet...

 

_Don't look down._

 

She looks down.

 

Then snaps her head back up, eyes screwed shut.  _God dammit_.

 

She swallows several times before being able to speak again. 

 

She can't believe she's about to say what she's about to say; still, through trembling lips and with a wince, she does let it out: the smallest sound ever.

 

"...kitty?"

 

His eyes find hers in the mirror.

 

"What?"

 

\---her eyebrows go imperceptibly up.

 

Oh. 

 

...oh,  _no._  

  

She stares, stunned, and he looks back down at the sink, or at her hands gripping it. 

 

"I'm losing it," she finally breathes. 

 

He's clearly very unimpressed by the whole situation. 

 

"Losing what?" he genuinely asks.

 

She blinks: "...my mind?"

 

"Oh."

 

He frowns.

"Shouldn't we go back to sleep?" He looks at her, at her nape, then bends slowly to rest his forehead against the side of her head. "Don't you need more sleep?"

 

...she's out of the bathroom and slams the door before he can react. 

 

It's not that she plans on running to  _get help_. Where would she find any, and what would she say? 

 

And she doesn't slam the door to keep him on the other side of it: it can only be locked from the inside, so she couldn't lock it even if she wanted to.

 

She slams it on impulse, simply because she panics.  

 

A confused "-- _wait-_ " comes from behind the door; she stops in her tracks and stands there to stare at it the second she sees that he doesn't open it. 

 

She understands later that it's not because he doesn't want to. 

 

But because for some reason, he  _can't_  -or rather he  _thinks_  he can't.

 

While she tries to calm herself down, he gently taps against the wood, panic now slowly creeping in  _his_  voice: 

 

"-- _wait_ ,  _uh_ \--did I do something? ...I--- I won't do it again--" he stammers, tapping more insistently, although still gently.

 

Even though his voice is slightly muffled by the door, she distinctively hears the dread he's trying to rein in:

 

"--whatever it is, I---what did I do?"

 

Eventually, the tapping stops. 

 

A brief silence.

 

"I'm sorry!" he tries suddenly --repeating a bit lower: "I'm sorry?"

 

\--but she stays there, arms useless at her sides.

 

Letting the silence stretch ----until she recognizes the telling scratching sounds of a trapped cat trying to get to her.

 

Her heart beats stronger as she warily opens the door to see for herself. 

 

The cat is looking up at her with wide eyes, and the sight of him after having left a man inside properly  _spooks_  her -causing her to slam the door close again. 

 

She forces herself to inhale deeply. 

 

_It's fine. You're not in danger. It's okay. Calm down. It's okay._

 

Once she believes she regained control over herself, she slowly opens the door back, wider and wider.

 

There's no cat to be found. 

 

She swallows, hesitant, her hand on the handle.

 

"---kitty?" 

 

A small, frightened, furry head very tentatively peers over the edge of the tub at the word. She can actually hear her heart  _break_. 

 

"Oh,  _baby_ \--"

 

She rushes over to the trembling animal to pick him up, stammering apologies at him between kisses. "I'm sorry,  _God_  --Mommy's insane..."

 

She holds him tight against her chest when she feels that he remains tense. "...Mommy's becoming insane."

 

The cat lets her bring him back into the bed, but as soon as she lets go he rushes under the covers to hide -something he never does. 

 

She should feel happy that he doesn't run out of the room, still she lies down and holds the hems of the covers in the air to try and beckon him closer, by her side.

 

"I'm sorry kitty, come. Come out, come."

 

But the animal doesn't budge. 

 

She rubs her face with a sigh, defeated, then rolls on her back to turn the light off.

 

She won't fall back asleep anytime soon, that she can be sure of.

 

And for she doesn't know how long indeed, she just stares at the dark. 

 

...after some time, though, she feels the mattress very progressively dip on the other side of the bed. 

 

Her heart beats harder in her chest in a second, but she doesn't move. 

 

 

"Can people become crazy because of too much solitude?" She whispers to herself. 

 

 

"...I don't know," someone replies next to her. 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Easy, easy / Pull out your heart to make the / Being alone / Easy. / You break the bridle to make / Losing control / Easy. Easy. / Crushed what you're holding so you / Can say letting go is / Easy.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8PIPyPMNnp8)


	6. Troy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter was supposed to be much longer, I've decided to cut it 
> 
> the next chapter will be up in two days =)

 

Rey wakes up drooling.

 

A large, heavy leg over her hips holds her down, along with an arm across her chest. The face of her...  _cat_ , is hidden in the crook of her neck, mouth warm on her skin. Before she opens her eyes, and before she completely realizes that she really shouldn't do it, her hand lovingly feels his thigh. 

 

She does open her eyes then, and hurries to extract herself from under his weight with  _anguish._

 

_What is wrong with her._

 

It earns her a grunt of protest from the bed. The second party of the hug isn't too happy with the separation. 

  

It prompts her to leave the room faster -and since he must act exactly like the cat she adopted, the heavy, tall, not-so-gracious man tumbles out of bed after her to follow wherever she leads him. 

 

She speeds up when she hears him behind her, and rushes inside the bathroom -closing the door  _without_ locking it, testing him on that a second time. 

 

Steps come to a halt behind it.

 

Three seconds pass maybe, before she hears gentle taps against the wood -and sure enough, the man stammers with a raspy, muffled voice:

 

"You---you closed the door."

 

How nice of him to inform her.

 

_" I'm aware."_

 

There's a short silence,  where she waits for him to walk away, but he doesn't. There's some hesitation. 

 

Then he negotiates, although without too much confidence. 

 

"...leave it a bit open?"

 

"No."

 

No hesitation from her. Boundaries. This is  _her_  home.

 

If he can't be away from her for  _fifteen minutes_ , how will he cope when she's at work for ten hours?

 

The question is supposed to be rhetorical; it doesn't have the effect intended on her. Rather, she squirms from guilt like many times before over how she spends all her time at work, leaving the cat alone for hours on end, wondering if maybe the animal isn't following her everywhere when she's with him just to make the most of her presence. 

 

The thought jabs her in the chest, and she feels utterly stupid for it.

 

Control, everything is out of control. She needs control. 

 

It takes a moment before she hears him step away. She doesn't know where to, and she doesn't care.

 

In the shower, she silently prays for everything to go back to normal. 

 

She wishes she'll be able to go out of this bathroom and find that her cat  _is_  in fact a cat, for good this time, and that she'll never have to worry about that changing ever again. 

 

Because she knows not to expect her prayers to ever be answered, she lingers, takes much more time than she usually would to dress and prepare -feeling she'd never completely be ready to face him even if she had all the time in the world. 

 

When she steps out of the bathroom, she hears him before she sees him -slow, regular,  _wet_  sounds. 

 

She pads to the kitchen.

 

And there he is. 

 

Head tilted all the way back, holding a bottle of milk with both hands, he takes his time gulping it all down with faint, satisfied groans and heavy eyelids, a few curls of black hair falling across his eyes.

 

\---so she believes her cat is a man, so  _what_? Nobody's perfect.

 

If you haven't had at least one delusional episode in your life, then what is even the point?

 

She takes everything in at once. His bare feet on the wooden floor. The curve of his back, his ass, how thick his thighs and calves are. Her cheeks heat up, and she's struck there, because his nakedness stares at her right in the face, like she's the one barging in where she's not supposed to, when in reality this is  _her_  fucking kitchen, and he's supposed to be her  _damn cat_. 

  

The sight certainly seals her mouth shut for a few seconds too long -before she finally thinks to herself:  _wasn't there a glass on that table, along with the bottles of milk he presumably drank before?_

 

"Didn't your mother teach you to use a glass?"

 

The bottle is immediately released with a wet pop, and he twists toward her, licking and sucking the milk off his lips before he mutters:

 

"--don't remember my mother."

 

It's clear that he doesn't have the slightest hint of bashfulness in him, and doesn't mind her _looking_ -still she physically  _cannot_  let her eyes wander more than she already has.

 

Turns out the naked body of a six-foot-two broad shouldered man doesn't elicit the same indifference from her as the naked body of a cat.

 

He puts the bottle down, and she tenses.

 

By force of habit, she anticipates his next move. Her pet, she knows, would have already rubbed himself all over her feet and calves by now, and not even for any reason in particular, although it is time for him to eat. 

 

Here, what happens is imperceptible to the naked eye -it's not something anyone who's unaware of the situation could have picked up on. She can feel his intent, his need for contact just at the way he turns to her, and she knows that, in return, he senses at the way she doesn't make a move toward him that he simply can't approach her and touch her the way he usually does.

 

His misadventure from last night is likely to be a key factor in his restraint. He stands there. Looking very much like a grounded child.

 

And how insane is it that she already feels close enough to this  _stranger_  to feel bad about it?

 

Jaw clenched, she firmly twists the cap back on the bottle, and puts it back in the fridge. He doesn't touch her, but he's still attentive to her every move, slightly pivoting left and right as she moves in the kitchen. 

 

She just wants him to be a cat.  _Is that too much to ask?_

 

"Don't drink anymore milk please." She presses her lips tight to stop herself from adding:  _you're gonna be sick if you do_. 

 

She doesn't make herself a tea. Without looking at him, she heads to the hallway -quickly letting him know that  _there's food in the fridge_  before she does.

 

He doesn't follow her to the door. 

 

Naturally, she doesn't get to spend a single minute at work without thinking about her cat  _transforming into a man at night and drinking her milk during the day -_ and what it all potentially means about her mental health. 

 

While her world at home has been turned upside down, the reality of her work remains the same. Customers continue to be downright abusive, the tasks given to her and her team continue to be dull, everything is exactly the way she would expect it to be: repetitive, soul-sucking and pointless. 

 

It makes her feel even more crazy. Like she's in the Truman show, and that while they act like they don't, all the people around her know what's going on in her apartment.

 

She's glad to finish early and leave the closing to another -she's even a bit impatient to be home, anticipating that  _her human_ , if the past days are anything to go by, should likely be back in his feline form. And she needs that - _she needs her pet cat._

 

The night has fallen already when she walks to her Honda in the parking lot, almost too tired to think straight.

 

Pulling her phone out, she sees three texts from Armie. Very unexpected.

 

The first text informs her that  _he's in town this afternoon, and what is she doing around five?_

 

The second, sent an hour later, tells her  _nevermind._  The third lets her know that he can drop by her apartment ten minutes or so around six if she's at home. She glances at the time. It's twelve past seven.

 

 ** _I just got off from work_** , is what she texts back. She would have welcomed the distraction, but looks like it yet again won't be for today. 

 

Just as she gets behind the wheel, she receives another text. 

 

_Works great actually, took way more time than expected. See you in 30?_

 

**_Sure_.**

 

Armie used to drop by all the time before he and Rose had their first kid, because Rey's apartment in on his way between his firm and their house. He'd stay maybe fifteen minutes, barely enough time to have a tea or a beer, to essentially say hello at a time when they already couldn't see each other a lot. Rey felt that it was better than nothing at all. 

 

It hasn't happened in over six months. 

 

Inviting anyone home seems counter-intuitive, in her situation. Probably because it is.

 

Yet at that moment it seems to her that there is no question. She misses her friend,  _of course_  she has ten minutes for him. 

 

Looking back, she'll understand that choice a bit differently ----her motivation more likely to be about a need to have someone she trusts to be mentally sane around her. 

 

Parking in her street she feels a pang in her chest knowing that with Armie on her heels, she likely won't get to have her cat running to her when she passes the door. Something she looked forward to _all day_. Unless she sees Armitage in front of her though, there's still a chance he'll cancel.

 

He doesn't cancel. When she approaches her building, he's right there, waiting for her on the sidewalk. 

 

For all her reluctance she grins widely when she sees him, and he does the same. They both must _look_ and _be_ equally exhausted. He's sporting the thickest beard he's ever grown yet. 

 

The tight, warm embrace he gives her relieves her of a lot of bitterness.

 

"Oh my God, Rey. Jesus Christ... Okay, let's get inside -I'm cold and I can't stay long."

 

Inside, she glances at the elevator, still out-of-service, and flips it off, before taking the stairs. Armie doesn't comment on it, too busy giving her as much information as he can before he'll have to leave.

 

"So. With Rose we've been wanting to see you for a while, you, Finnley, Poe, have a--"

 

"Poe?"

 

"Finn's new... uh, boyfriend, but don't tell him I called him that." She won't ask why. "You know  _have a proper night out_ ,  _but_ , Rose wants to go to a  _bar_ , or a restaurant, and it's fine,  _but:_  I don't want to leave the kids alone, they're too young, and there's too many of them, three is like---a  _lot_ , you know?--"

 

She doesn't. He barely takes the time to breathe while speaking, and climbing the stairs does nothing to help him. 

 

"I tell her  _look_ , go see everyone, go see your friends, watch a movie or something, I don't mind, but then she tells me that  _she_ 'll feel guilty if she goes by herself, except that in a bar  _I_  won't enjoy myself either if I have to nervously check the time every five minutes just because I'm on edge thinking about the kids the whole time, and how they're alone, and what could happen to them --she goes  _they wouldn't be alone_ , and I'm like  _you know what I mean_ \--"

 

"Armie, get to the point."

 

He huffs as they get to her door, out-of-breath. 

 

"The point is, couldn't we do something at your place? The kids could sleep in your bedroom, Rose still gets to leave the house and see you, I doubt it's ideal but--"

 

"Sure," she sighs, unlocking her door. Stepping inside, she turns the lights on. "You seemed to assume I would say no."

 

As expected, no cat welcomes her. She should have asked Armitage to lower his voice. The apartment is completely silent. 

 

"But I mean you don't mind having us all in your... tiny home? No offense."

 

"Why would I mind? I haven't seen anybody in a while." She drops her purse, hangs her coat. Armitage keeps his on.

 

It'll be a shorter visit than she thought it'd be, then.

 

"Alright --tea, please," he tells her before she asks -and before they're even out of the hallway. 

 

Her legs hurt from standing and shuffling all day. She goes straight to the counter of her kitchen, repressing a yawn. Turning all the lights on, she can see that there's no bottle of milk on the table. 

 

Armitage clears his throat behind her, and before she can react, she hears him say in the room: 

 

"Armitage."

 

She frowns, turning around to see him give a small nod --looking all the way over to the other side of her apartment, in the living-room. 

 

In the dark, sitting on the couch with his hands on his thighs, staring at Armie with a carefully blank expression before his eyes find her, is the  _very naked man_  she left inside this morning. 

 

Her eyes go wide, eyebrows go up, and the air gets stuck in her lungs.

 

Armitage stands there, waiting for someone to break what's likely to be just a very awkward silence for him. 

 

_So that's still a thing._

 

Not only that, but it's a very  _real thing_  now, because  _Armitage can see him_. This is happening. Actually happening.

 

She can't believe she thought being crazy was the worst possibility.

 

Holy shit. 

It's a lot to process while trying to come up with something that'll justify to her friend why a  _naked man_  was waiting for them on her couch  _in the dark._  

 

She can't even spare a second on the fact that Armitage thought that was common enough to introduce himself as if it had happened a hundred times before, instead of yelling like any normal person would have.

 

And because she must say something before her  _cat_  does and makes the situation worse, she ends up stammering -a lot. 

 

"A-Armie, this--this is---this is  _Troy_."

 

The second she gets the word out, she bites her tongue. 

 

Troy.

 

Of all the names in the world, _Troy_ is the one that comes to her mind. A letter away from  _Roy_ , the name of her ex-boyfriend -and current colleague of Armitage.

 

She's wrong to think that this is rock bottom. 

 

" _Benjamin_ ," her cat corrects her. He glances at Armitage, then back at her. "...my name is Benjamin."

 

Armitage slowly turns his head to her, eyebrows all the way up on his forehead. Mirroring her. 

 

"...is it Troy or Benjamin?" he tries to ask discreetly, murmuring while his lips barely move.

 

She first produces pained groan, but it does morph into words, the apologetic smile she's going for bound to be a grimace.

 

"Ah, I, I-- I met  _Benjamin_  yesterday--"

 

Forgetting the name of a one-night stand, as this is the next best lie she can deliver, a one-night stand she supposedly allowed to stay at her place the whole following day, is humiliating enough -but _boy_ is she unprepared for what comes next.

 

Now Benjamin is downright offended.

 

 _"I've been living here for over a month_ ," he corrects again, a crease on his forehead,  _like he's genuinely hurt_. 

 

She slowly closes her mouth; then lowers her head to rest it in her hand, defeated -hiding her eyes in embarrassment.

 

Armitage clears his throat. Again. 

 

"Oh, wow," he softly says, politely pretending like this is a normal conversation. "...new roomie, awesome."

 

"Look, Armie," she groans in her palm, "how about we drink that tea another day?"

  

"You got it, Sunshine." He turns to leave the kitchen, then stops to wave at her cat. "See you around, uh, _Benjamin_."

 

Her cat just stares at him, not moving a muscle. Very visibly  _vexed_. 

 

Right before she closes the front door behind him, Armitage reminds her of the night out she promised him and his wife, then turns around one last time with a comforting tone. 

 

"I don't need to know everything, Rey. I'm not judging. Honestly--"

 

He interrupts himself to lower his voice: 

 

"Good for you, woman."

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Is anything as strange as a / Normal person? / Is anyone as cruel as a, / a normal person? / I'm so confused, am I / a normal person? You know / I can't tell if I'm / a normal person, it's true](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UqDAwLW4dYk)


	7. No questions asked

 

Rey locks the door, leaving the key inside and closing the several slide-locks. 

 

Then, she tilts her head slightly to listen and be sure that Armitage does take the stairs, and that he won't listen in on the very interesting exchange that is about to happen between her and her pet. 

 

She hears Armitage run down the stairs, then the silence in the staircase on the other side of the door echoes the one of her apartment behind her.

 

She's tempted to unlock and open the door to check if he's really gone, but then a voice of reason reminds her that no matter how entertaining his very brief visit has been, Armitage must have other priorities as a father of three.

 

She allows herself to breathe, and finally turns around. 

 

Only to stop  _right there_  before she bumps into the very solid human form of her cat -because he apparently left the couch to silently come and stand behind her, like a creep. 

 

She lets out a sharp sigh through her nose. He doesn't pick up on her irritation.

 

Too focused on his own grief.

 

"...why did you say we met  _yesterday_?"

 

The tone is not quite accusatory -once again, he rather looks and sounds like she genuinely hurt his feelings, the gall. She lifts up her hands, baffled.

 

" _You never told me your name. W_ hat did you want me to say to justify that, exactly?" She's amazed that she has to explain the obvious. "You've been living with me for a  _month_ , and I don't know your name? Do you realize how that makes me look?" 

 

There's a brief pause, and while he looks down at her, she can see that he's actually taking a second to think about it. But he lets out a soft, sheepish  _no,_  with a small shake of his head. 

 

As in  _no_ , he in fact  _doesn't_  realize why not knowing the name of a person you live with can be perceived as bizarre.

 

She blinks, giving him the time needed to let her know he's kidding. 

 

But he's not kidding. He's clueless.

 

"...bad," she concludes flatly. "It makes me look bad."

 

A brief crease of his forehead betrays his confusion while he considers her words -yet he doesn't demand any further explanation. Instead, he swallows -then quietly asks his follow up question: 

 

"--who is he?"

 

She stands back to look at him good. Is this what her life is going to be now? Go to work, spend ten hours getting insulted by customers, then go home and argue with her cat? 

 

_Discuss with her pet cat about his feelings of jealousy?_

 

She gives him a bored look, then passes him, finally going back to her kitchen; with him on her heels, naturally.

 

"He's an old friend of mine, if you must know,  _Benjamin_."

 

A low rumble from his stomach has her slowly turn her head to him before either of them say anything else. The sound stretches and finishes in a weak gurgle. She studies his face for a second, while he just stands there. The question leaves her lips before she can analyze why.

 

"What did you eat at noon?"

  

She's not  _worried_ , but... something unpleasant pulses right under her ribs, and she doesn't know where it comes from. Despite not being able to treat the man in front of her the same way she treats her cat, it's as if she can't completely forget everything about the protective instinct she has toward the animal in him. The one she's had ever since she let him in, during the storm. 

 

She could have ignored it though, if his answer had been any different.

 

"Nothing." He's very casual about it. 

 

And  _oh_ , she is not. She doesn't get to ponder why she's so upset so fast about him missing a single meal. 

 

_"Why didn't you eat something?"_

 

He remains faithful to the general candid demeanor he's been going for so far -and shows once more a genuine puzzlement.

 

"You said the food is in the fridge," he very unhelpfully points out. 

 

_"It is."_

  

"I---how was I supposed to open it?" he asks before her very eyes.

 

They stand there for a few seconds without making a single move. Eventually, she opens the fridge. Nothing has been touched. Not the noodles, not the  _chèvre_ , not the eggs -not the cabbage or the carrots in the last compartment. 

 

Her fridge constantly looks like it's the end of the month now. She used to take her time buying her groceries, she used to have the energy, put a lot of thought into it because she'd put a lot of effort into her cooking. Not anymore. 

 

Right at that moment, she distractedly thinks to herself that she must have believed his human form was real -as much as she could while trusting that she was going insane- to leave him without even a little bit of cat food in his bowl.

 

Not that it would have been ideal by any means. She also doesn't imagine that the quantities needed for a fifteen pounds cat are the same for a...  _one hundred and eighty pounds human._

 

She looks up; the last bottle of milk is still there on the fridge, untouched. She turns to him, hand still on the door handle.

 

"So when I told you there was food in the fridge, you, what... thought I was taunting you?"

 

She secretly needs him to reassure her. But he just stands there being all awkward and looking for words, because  _yes_ \--yes, that  _is_  what he apparently thought. That she left for work forbidding him to drink milk and letting him know he couldn't access the rest of the food. Him. A grown man with very capable hands.

 

She's not ready to dislodge from his head what it is that makes him believe he can't open and close doors, or to even discuss it -not tonight.

 

"Sit."

 

While getting a few things out of the fridge, she expects a chair to scrape against the floor. When there's only silence, she turns around and sure enough, he's sitting on the floor a knee drawn up to his chest, near the oven  -at the exact spot where he always sits as a cat if he's not on the counter. 

 

Silly of her, she should have specified. 

 

" _Sit on a chair_ , you'll be more comfortable."

 

She starts the preparation of his meal -a thick, cream-heavy  _omelette_  with some  _chèvre_  and onions -leaving the cold noodles for herself.

 

_Is she really just going to accept the fact that her cat can change into a human, no questions asked?_

 

She sighs, rubbing her eyes. 

 

Maybe she can allow herself to just breathe tonight. Feed him, watch T.V., then go to bed. She'll have other occasions to interrogate him, if turning into a human becomes a habit.

 

She glances at him from time to time while cooking. He's just watching her move around, like always when she's in the kitchen, although usually he's also giving another type of attention to her calves and her feet, or asking to receive that same attention from her hands -things he wouldn't mind doing and getting from her in his human form, she suspects, but again, he seems to have drawn a few conclusions from her change of behavior around him. 

 

That is, that she's not holding him close into her arms, and she's not petting him. 

 

A soft _thank you_  welcomes his plate when she serves him, right before she shows him his fork, holding it in front of him: "Use this. You hold--"

 

She doesn't get to finish her sentence, because he takes the fork from her with a low, petulant  _"I know what a fork is."_

 

She stands back, eyebrows up. The fucking nerve. When she sits across him, she thinks she hears him mutter:

 

"...I'm not a kitten."

 

It really takes her to actually bite her tongue not to retort an unnecessarily sharp  _you don't know how to open_   _doors._ Instead, she settles for sarcasm: 

 

" _Sorry for assuming_. ---As you can see, it's steaming hot, wait a bit before eating."

 

He doesn't wait and burns himself, flinching and dropping the bite back into the plate. 

 

Good. 

 

Next time he'll know to trust her words. 

 

The meal goes on without any other incident of the type -he  _does_  know how to use a fork- but she can feel that something upsets him. She's determined not to ask what's wrong, but he spills it out on his own, mumbling the words very low.

 

"I don't want so many people to come in here."

 

She needs a moment to understand that he must have overheard her conversation with Armitage.

 

She puts her chopsticks down and sits back to check her phone, sure to be saying nothing of any real importance when she says, her eyes on the screen:

 

"This isn't your place, last I checked."

 

She scrolls down her notifications, zoning out a bit then notices that she doesn't hear his fork scraping the plate anymore. 

 

She looks up. He's staring back, completely struck; she can practically hear his heart break. Something is falling apart in him, and she has no clue what it is, until he asks barely loud enough for her to hear:

 

"...it's not?"

 

Once more, his reaction doesn't make sense right away to her, but  _she realizes what she said_  -and she stammers, mortified:

 

"I mean you--don't pay the _rent_ , but it's---you, you still live here."

 

He doesn't say anything, but she can see that he's not reassured at all. He's not finishing his plate.

 

"Just--  _forget that_ ," she tries again, "forget what I said."

 

He looks down at his food and murmurs as if to himself:

 

"You've been... acting weird, since--since---"

 

And he stops there, like he's actually trying to figure out why she's been acting  _weird_. Because it doesn't seem like he'll say it aloud, she finishes the sentence for him:

 

"Since you  _very unexpectedly turned into a human?"_

 

He pauses, stunned. " _Yes_ ," he nods, eyes round like she just resolved a fucking enigma. " _Exactly_."

 

She can't believe this. She narrows her eyes, explaining slowly: _"Benjamin I can't behave around a human the way I do around a cat."_

 

He's only more confused, like she just pointed out something that never occurred to him. "Why?"

 

"Because!"

 

She first says it because it feels that the word is enough on its own -but saying it causes her to think about what the rest of that sentence would be, what her very excellent, very legitimate reasons are, and at the moment, nothing comes. So she repeats it -with more feelings.

 

_"Because."_

 

Then, when it doesn't bring her the satisfaction she expected, she deflects: "Eat!"

 

It's clearly not an answer satisfying enough to him either. His sadness is there to see, making it difficult for him to eat despite how he tries to obey and finish his plate.

 

She stands and goes to throw away the greasy packaging of her noodles just to do something and not sit there -almost missing it when he mutters behind her, bitter: 

 

"You've never told me your name either." 

 

Without turning back to him, she gives it. 

 

"It's Rey." 

 

He doesn't reply anything to that, but when she glances back at him, she catches him mouthing it to himself. 

 

_Rey._

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [The seed of all this indecision isn't me, oh no / Cause I decided long ago / It feels like I only go backwards, darling / Every part of me says, "go ahead" / I got my hopes up again, oh no, not again / Feels like we only go backwards, darling](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wycjnCCgUes)
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> Next chapter will be up on Thrusday, or Friday  
> Thank you so much for reading =)


	8. How human

 

The situation is awkward.

 

To avoid going further into the whole  _why won't you pet me and hold me and kiss me the way you always do_ , Rey turns her back to him and does the dishes, the ones from tonight and some she left in the sink from yesterday.

 

Meanwhile, her cat sits there and watches her do.

 

The silence between them doesn't help.

 

She's set to ignore him, and ignore the situation altogether, but it's proven to be rather difficult when she can essentially feel the weight of his eyes searching for answers all over her.

 

The few times she glances at him he very slightly straightens up on his chair, like a student whose name has been called by his teacher -but she turns her head back just as fast.

 

And maybe because he hadn't considered that the truth could potentially be hard to hear, and he isn't too impatient to know the answer anymore, her cat doesn't ask again why she's being distant.

 

But she can practically hear him think hard about it; worse, she can sense that he's hitting the same wall over and over again, always circling back to the same dead ends while trying to solve what is for him a pure and simple mystery.

  

She'd feel less cruel if she could explain to him with soft, patient words why his transformation caused her to be... not as warm as usual, but she's not sure she can, and she's not sure he would ever understand her reasons anyway.

 

She presses her lips tight.

 

\--everything would be so much simpler if he would just turn back into his feline form.

 

Like  _come on._

 

What's the point of being a human anyway if they don't talk?  _He_  knows, and  _she_  knows that all he wants is to be her  _pet_. 

 

She'd like to expressly ask him to turn back into a cat, but she's afraid he'll be more vexed than he already is. And maybe it's safe to assume that, if he could, given how little he enjoys being a human right now, he would have done so already.

 

It's a  _lot_  for one day.

 

"I'm gonna watch T.V.," she mumbles, throwing the sponge in the sink -as if that's something she had to keep him informed of, as if he wasn't going to follow her anyway.

 

He's up and on her heels the next moment.

Gone are the soft, dancing paws on the wooden floor --a giant is stomping right behind her. She's used to watching where she puts her feet to avoid stepping on his tail, now she's almost quickening her pace to the living-room, or  _she's_ the one who's going to be stepped on.

 

She knows the habits of her cat by heart, so just like she expected he would, when she approaches the couch, he goes around the opposite side, something he does before running and jumping straight on her lap. 

 

Except that this time, of course, when she lets herself down on her usual spot on the right side of the couch, her legs folded under her -none of that happens.

 

She turns the T.V. on without a word, and no matter how discreet it is she notices it  _again_ , how his shoulders slightly sag, the moment he realizes  _yet again_  that it won't be like every other night.

 

She imagines that her not calling him or pulling him to her must hit him the hardest, and his quiet and renewed disenchantment just translates into a small, brief hesitation before he sits down, the human way, awkwardly, his hands on his thighs -his fingers slowly curling until they nervously close into fists and then open again.

 

Before her cat came into her life, watching T.V. was just a way for her to fry as many brain cells as possible.

 

Anything that requires her to focus even a little bit, she avoids like the plague. At just thirty-three, she doesn't want to be enlightened anymore, she doesn't want to change the world.

 

Her dreams only consist of calling in sick to work or canceling the plans she  _doesn't_  have with her friends to stay at home and do  _nothing -_ give up on being entertained, give up on being a better person, just lie down and stare at the ceiling all day. 

 

In another world, the T.V. could have been used for better purposes. Since Roy left her, she has twice the room on the couch, and the T.V. is an okay illusion of a presence.

 

Lately though, she hasn't been so much drooling on the couch as she's been drooling over her loving, grateful and devoted pet cat.

 

And watching T.V. hasn't been what it used to be.

 

For the past month it's been reduced to an extra in the background, the real show happening right in her lap, the jingles she used to zone out to fading out in favor of the continuous purr against her belly.

 

Her hands itch and her heart  _aches_.

 

It's been less than twenty-four hours that he hasn't been in his feline form and she  _misses him._

 

She can all the more appreciate how hooked she is on the experience, now that her cat is a human and that she's back to having to just watch T.V., switching channels until her thumb hurts.

 

Resolutely not looking at him, she still can't help but be attentive to each sound coming from his side of the couch, when there is any. He mainly remains perfectly silent.

 

At times, he slightly readjusts his position on the couch -she suspects because he doesn't know what to do with himself.

 

She swallows, trying to ignore him.

 

She's in desperate need of a distraction from the situation, but she doubts the T.V. will provide it; until chance -or irony- leads her to a rebroadcast of  _Homeward Bound: The Incredible Journey._

 

Her thumb stills.

 

At seven, she knew all the lines of that 1993 movie by heart, because she spent entire afternoons alone watching it on repeat at her grandpa's house.

 

Her nostalgia is through the roof in a couple of shots, and her lips move along on their own at the first lines she hears.

 

While Chance, the American bulldog and narrator of the movie, explains why he has no interest in being a good pet to his owner, she discreetly gauges her cat's reaction.

 

He certainly doesn't look as invested as her, eyeing the screen without really reacting to what happens on it.

 

Is she doing this?

 

Is she going to insult her cat by making him sit there while she sobs for the return of a dog to his human?

 

No matter how strong her connection with that movie is, two dogs and a cat crossing an entire fucking country to find their humans won't exactly take her mind off what's happening between her and her own pet. 

 

After a few minutes, cautiously, she risks a glance on her left.

 

He's stopped watching the movie, absently staring at the space in front of him like he's thinking something over, somewhat fidgety now, biting the inside of his cheek.

 

Trying to focus on the movie, she silently sighs, jaw tight, resolute not to check on him anymore until she goes to bed. 

 

Less than a minute later, she checks on him.

 

He is  _not_  watching the movie.

 

He's basically sulking -but privately, to himself. 

 

So maybe  _sulking_  isn't the word. 

 

It's possible that he's just hurt.

 

So far, turning the T.V. on, to him, meant that -in her presence at least- he'd have his back scratched, that he'd be petted and kissed on his ears, eyes and nose.

 

Looks like when he can't sprawl himself all over her, watching T.V. isn't as fun for him either.

 

From the corner of her eye, she sees that the paws he usually uses to knead her belly are now just rhythmically clenching.

 

She gives up, and cocks her head to him, asking softly:

 

"You don't like the movie?"

 

He glances at her, then quietly sighs through his nose.

 

"...yes, I do" he murmurs, his eyes anywhere but on the screen.

 

She brings her attention back on the film for a moment --then looks back at him. She doesn't want to insist, and she thinks she shouldn't insist -but then, she does insist.

 

"--you're not watching it," she gently points out, trying to engage.

 

He readjusts himself on the couch once more, his eyes finding the screen. He keeps them there, to genuinely try and please her, she presumes, but she can plainly see that his focus is miles away from it.

 

Rey pays attention to what Sassy the Himalayan cat says for a handful of seconds before she glimpses at her own cat again.

 

He's biting his nails.

 

How human of him. 

 

Before she gives it any more thought, she unfolds her legs from under her.

 

"Come here," she hears herself say, a hand on her thigh, patting the fabric of her denim.

 

She's looking at him, and she has his attention, but there's a lot of hesitation when he turns his head to her, as if he was expecting to have misheard. 

 

When he sees her looking back at him, there's more hesitation. She thinks he's going to ask her to repeat -until he plants a hand on the couch beside him instead, still very tentatively. 

 

Then, he slowly twists to go and crawl to her -still hesitant, still visibly expecting her to stop him.

 

And when that  _six-foot two naked man_  moves toward her, she  _does_  stop him. 

 

" _Don't_ \--" she hurries to say, lifting a hand up in front of him, and he flinches, stilling there, before she finishes her sentence: "-- _climb into my lap_ , you're too big."

 

She taps on her lap: "Lie down, and lay your head here."

 

He obeys, lowering himself while turning to be on his side, until his head come to carefully rest in her lap -his back to the T.V.

 

"--'don't care about what happens to Shadow?" 

 

"...no," he admits. 

 

She doesn't either.

 

Long, strong legs are gracelessly folded to fit on the rest of the couch, the knees pushing against the backrest; he rearranges himself until his forehead is gently pressing against her lower belly, his eyes closing from apparent relief, while she pretends like she's perfectly blasé and cool about it, hoping he won't notice how red her cheeks must be if he ever looks up.

 

He brings his arms right up against his chest to keep them there, one hand closing on the hem of her shirt -his eyes opening again.

 

Expectant.

 

She's never seen a man so big look so small. She could have sworn he was about her age. Now she's not so sure.  

 

His ear is flushed and parting his hair, and she places a slightly trembling hand right under it, then leaves it flat on the side of his neck, taking a moment to feel his pulse under her palm -the warm, timid throb under his skin that could have been the ghost of a purr.

 

She knows she's imagining it, yet she could swear she can hear it just by looking at him. She's not even moving her hand but his brow has already loosened, his mouth relaxes into a round, supple form, his whole body visibly more soft and pliant.

 

And herself feels  _so much better_  than a minute ago -this feels so much better; this feels  _right_.

 

\--as if a weight had been lifted from her chest the second his head came to rest in her lap.

 

The pad of her thumb comes up to caress his brow, tracing his cheekbone, then the shell of his ear -and his eyes close again with a soft  _mmh_  behind closed lips.

 

It's the first time in her life that she's snuggled with someone before _meeting_ them; the first time she considers living with someone she...  really doesn't know.

 

Roy had to beg her for  _two years_  before she moved in with him.

 

She runs her fingers through his hair, feeling his hand tighten around her shirt at her hip, blaming her exhaustion for how alarmingly fast she's decided she was okay with this -and feeling her heart beat just fast enough to suggest that she should maybe stop. 

 

That maybe, she should at least  _want_  to stop. 

 

But her hand is still soothingly running in his hair while her eyes go back on the screen, although she's not really watching the movie.

 

Thoughts she dealt with many times before intrude into her mind and make waves on its flat surface, and she's unable to stop them.

 

What happens when her relationship with her cat inevitably falls apart, and he has nowhere to go? She keeps thinking of him as a cat, and she keeps  _calling_  him a cat, but right now he looks very much like a human to her, and if she knows anything about those, it's that they're unpredictable.

 

A cat is so much easier to love. 

 

Why can't he be a cat? 

 

Her thumb brushes his temple, and she feels his head turn just a bit on her thighs. When she looks down, he's looking back through his eyelashes, the lights on the T.V. dancing on him. 

\---with something in his eyes close to adoration.

 

She abruptly twists and gets up, letting his head bounce on the cushion.

 

She turns the T.V. off.

 

 _Benjamin_  hurries to stand up, hair disheveled, blinking -confused.

 

"I'm going to bed," she informs him this time -although she delivers it more like a sentence than a simple update.

 

Of course, as she should have expected it, he takes that as a command to go to bed with her -because when she promptly gets a comforter out of the dresser to drop it at the end of the couch, he doesn't take the hint, and follows her in the hallway to the bedroom.

 

"You don't come in here," she lets him know just as she passes the doorway -her voice cold to her own ears.

 

There's only stunned silence when he stops right in his tracks behind her to tell her anything about how he takes the news. 

 

It's the first time she forbids him to enter the bedroom. She focuses on taking her jeans off and slips under the covers right away, as is, deliberately ignoring him --until she hears him stammer:

 

"I--where do I sleep?"

 

"The couch."

 

Everything is silent again. 

 

Which means he's currently not walking to the couch. 

 

She doesn't move a muscle.

 

After maybe a minute, he asks, just high enough for her to hear, as if to not disturb the quiet:

 

"Is, is it about-- the..."

 

Then he tries again.

"I--you can invite who you want. You're right-- _you_  pay the rent... I'm sorry---"

 

She shuts her eyes hard, interrupting him: 

 

" _It's not that_. You shouldn't sleep in the bed anymore."

 

A beat. 

 

"...why not?"

 

_"Because."_

 

A long moment of silence stretches again. 

 

Until eventually, she hears him turn around -and finds the way to the couch, making it creak under his weight.

 

Then, she can't sleep. 

 

With wide eyes, she stares at the dark, and makes absolutely no progress toward sleep, simply because she's busy thinking about  _her cat who's sleeping in the next room._

 

The cat she sent there to sleep by himself when herself hates sleeping alone.

 

She turns a few times in her bed, but she's certain of it, she's on the right track toward a night of insomnia -no doubt about it. 

 

At least, she's certain of it until half an hour later, she tilts her head and stops breathing --- _to better hear the distinctive sound of little paws_  quietly rushing across the wooden floor of the apartment, down the hallway, closer still, until they slow down near the doorway and enters the bedroom without a sound.

 

When the cat jumps on the opposite side of the bed, his landing is near silent on the covers, and she can see his faint silhouette freeze before his head slowly bows in guilt, as if he expected her to be asleep already and is afraid that she'll shoo him away, now that she caught him deliberately disobeying. 

He slowly lets himself down right where he is, seemingly to be sure that he's not pushing his luck, and she can't help but look away, feeling her throat tighten without really knowing why.

 

When she looks back, he's still lying down -but he got closer, now finding himself just a foot away from her while acting like he's got nothing to do with it.

 

She closes her eyes. She's never been more tired with herself. 

 

She should tell him to stay, or tell him to go -but she's only able to lie there.

 

Her eyes fly open again when she feels a paw hesitantly rest on her shin. She cranes her neck to look straight at him in the dark, and he stills once more, waiting for her to ignore him like she's done so far, but she doesn't. 

 

She sits up this time, and he lowers his head, flattening his ears back in submission --not expecting her to grab him and roughly pull him to her.

 

She takes him under the covers with her to press him against her chest there, giving up a second time tonight, holding him tight under her chin and feeling her affection for him slacken the knots of her back, her stomach and her neck--

 

\---not letting go until his purrs rolling through her chest soothe her to sleep.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Oh, my love, my darling / I've hungered for / Your touch / A long, lonely time / Time goes by so slowly / And time can do so much / Are you / Still mine?](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RXARHZmpgvw)


	9. Casual intimacy

 

 

Two months after her cat has first turned into a human, Rey knows that she knows nothing. 

 

The first thing she does is buy him clothes. Two sweatshirts, two sweatpants, and a few pairs of boxers. She doesn't discuss it with him beforehand, simply because there's nothing to discuss: it's non-negotiable -and when he puts them on, she gets to find out that he instantly hates it. 

 

Yet, she also finds out that it's not the first time in his life that he wears clothes, because he doesn't ask which is what, or how to put it on. He takes the sweatshirt from her hand and puts it on without a word, then the boxers, his shoulders remaining stiff while he tries to get used to the fabric against his skin -then refuses to wear the sweatpants, pointing out that he's already covered. 

 

So he knows why people dress other than just protecting themselves from the cold, he knows  _what_  needs most to be covered, and he knows what modesty is ---he just doesn't have any.

 

She's not impatient for the day she'll have to make him wear shoes.

 

Incidentally he's never wearing pants, but it's still major progress from being entirely naked -and if she didn't say anything he wouldn't wear the sweatshirt either, but she tries to never let it slide. 

 

She still sees him naked on numerous occasions. The second she's out the door, she knows that he undresses completely -and when she comes home, if he's in his human form, he hurries to grab the clothes he abandoned on the floor and quickly puts them on. Not because he feels any guilt for not wearing them when he's alone. He just hurries to put them on because she prefers him that way, so he can then rush to her, like his day is finally starting now that she's here. 

 

Because he wants to please her. 

 

Oh,  _he does._

 

She's not aware right away of just how much he craves her approval and her praise. As days go by though, it becomes clear that satisfying her is all that matters to him.

 

The more she lets him know she's happy with him, with his obedience and his progress, the more effort he makes, the more compliant he becomes.

 

Which is good, because she has a lot to teach him, and there are many, very simple ways to reward him. Giving him  _crème fraîche_  is one of them.

 

Having him so close to her all the time, following her constantly and stand by her, seeking the warmth, the contact and comfort she always gives him when he's a cat without daring to ask for it, she starts showing her appreciation through touch, whether it's a caress of his neck, or a squeeze of his hand.

 

\--preferring not to dive into how her own needs might mirror his.

 

After just a week of living with him, one evening, the both of them are in the bathroom, her brushing her teeth and him pulling on a strand at the hem of his sweatshirt, when she catches a scent. 

 

Something floral she'd recognize anywhere. 

 

She realizes just then that he's never smelled bad to her -and how come?

 

"Did you --" she starts, sniffing him, her mouth full of toothpaste. 

 

She means to ask  _did you take a shower_ , asking instead: "--use my shampoo?"

 

He nods absently. "Yes."

 

_Huh._

 

She doesn't suppose it'd make a lot of sense to be mad about it.

 

What did she think, that his transformations back and forth cleaned him in the process? He's been using the shower. That's good. That's---

"-- _wait_ , did you use my towel?"

 

"Yes."

 

She sighs, sending a few droplets of toothpaste on the mirror.

 

"You'll be using another one from now on."

 

He nods, eyes on the strand. "Okay."

 

She spits in the sink, rinses her mouth, then freezes, eyes on him in the mirror. 

 

"Benjamin?"

 

"Yes?"

 

She turns to him. 

 

"Do you brush your teeth?"

 

"Yes."

 

No further questions, there's only one toothbrush in the whole apartment.

 

"I'll buy you a toothbrush tomorrow."

 

"Thank you."

 

"You're welcome. Stop using mine."

 

He nods. 

 

Life with Benjamin rapidly turns out to be less about taking care of a five-year old, like she first assumed it was going to be, and more about---guiding and taking care of someone who just woke up from a coma.

 

His memory, and the knowledge he has of the world are like rough drafts: incomplete, but not blank.

 

He can read, and he knows a few words in Spanish, for some unknown reason -but some simple words are missing in his vocabulary, like  _comforter_ , or  _light bulb_.

 

She discovers early on that he knows how to make french toasts, hence recognizing and being able to use a pan, a whisk and a stove -and he knows a few other recipes, like how to prepare a pesto sauce. 

 

However, he doesn't remember ever drinking  _tea_ , or ever eating _cereals._  

 

He can type on a laptop, but doesn't know what  _Google_  is.

 

In the beginning, his main issue is that he does everything in half. He opens jars, then leaves them that way. He turns the lights on, and then leaves the room without turning them off -which is, again, progress from sitting naked  _in the dark_.

 

It's not too much a problem because he rarely goes into a room without her, but when it happens, she has to check after him to be sure that she'll still be able to pay her bills, and even though he mysteriously doesn't treat the tap or the gas the same way, the first week, just in case, she prepares his meals and the water he'll need in advance before leaving for work, and forbids him to use the stove and the tap in her absence.

 

She repeats herself a lot, and she tests him, leaving the lights on when he's right behind her, to see if he'll turn them off himself. And many times, he doesn't, and she has to insist a lot before one evening, he  _does_  turn them off on his own and she literally  _squeals from sheer joy._

 

Although the sound makes him flinch, something in his eyes lets her know right then and there that she'll never have to worry about him leaving the lights on ever again.

 

He's positively  _glowing_ at her praise. 

 

Slowly but surely a lot comes back into place -not everything, and maybe not enough in the beginning, but more and more each day.

 

As for the doors, it's something else entirely.

 

It doesn't matter how many times she shows him how to open or close them. He just repeats that he can't do it, and she quickly stops insisting, when she sees that his failure to please her causes him to become visibly more distraught every time she asks.

 

Something like this certainly isn't worth upsetting him -in fact given the way her chest tightens then she's not sure anything is worth it.

 

So he never uses the doors, instead tapping on them when he needs her to open one -usually the fridge, or the wardrobe -then remains extremely fidgety when she closes the bathroom door to take a shower. He doesn't like it, not at all. 

 

He'll sit on the couch, his jaw and his shoulders tense and his eyes on the door until she's done and comes out.

 

He continues to stay away from the windows.

 

He has a few notions of how to behave as a human, but some memories are fresher than others, some skills intact and others vanished.

 

There's potential, and he learns fast, because in addition to wanting her to be pleased with him, she believes that what he's learning with her, he learned it all before and then  _forgot_  -possibly starting all over several times in his life, although she wouldn't entirely be sure why.

 

She just noticed that the more time he spends in his human form, the easier it is for him grasp human concepts and ways -leading her to believe that the opposite happens when he changes into a cat.

 

Those are just things she observes, without daring to directly ask him anything the first few days, when he still feels a lot like a stranger to her -like it'd feel inappropriate to ask someone you just met what their sexual orientation is, or what their relationship with their mother is like. 

 

Just because he's her cat, doesn't mean she's entitled to know everything about his past or his private life. 

 

Soon though, she discovers that there's in fact not much to know.

 

When she asks about his parents, he doesn't seem distressed, or angry, or anything else -he just doesn't remember them. When asked where he lived before living with her, he just vaguely replies  _the street_.

 

He's not hiding anything. Those are simply all the answers he has.

 

But if he's not completely clueless to the ways of humans, he must have lived as a human before, at least?

 

"Yes", he tells her without the faintest hesitation, "I have." They're eating lunch, an incomplete, bastardized  _tajine_  they've cooked together when she asks him that, and he pauses, seeming confused as to why she'd be curious about this.

 

And when she asks him where and when he lived as a human, how many times and for how long, he searches for precise answers, but fails to find any.

 

He remembers being a child, and he remembers some of his first transformations. Something coming naturally to him - _instinctively_. The rest is blurry.

 

He doesn't even know if he's been more often a cat in his life or a human, or rather he doesn't quite understand the question, because it turns out that he doesn't separate the two quite like she does. It's one and the same to him, or two halves of the same whole -a lot like the air we inhale must be exhaled.

 

And it's not just that he doesn't remember, but she can see that he doesn't really mind not remembering.

 

He does talk about  _a bat-eared fox_. 

 

"A fox? ...someone who can change back and forth, like you?"

 

He nods. "From Zimbabwe."

 

She quirks an eyebrow.  _Is he making this up?_

 

Then, she hears him murmur to himself: " _Mazvita" --_ before he absently adds:  "She kept me warm."

 

\---as if that was a legitimate anecdote to say about someone.

 

When she asks where that fox is now, he tells her that he doesn't know. 

 

Her understanding of his transformations deepens while getting him used to not sleep in her bed in his human form. 

 

The first nights, he systematically transforms back into a cat to be able to sleep snuggled against her. Unsurprisingly, she doesn't find sleep until he joins her, which leads her to notice that it takes him more and more time to turn into a cat every night that passes. 

 

She realizes then that he transforms less often in general, and for shorter periods of time. 

 

One night she gets the confirmation that--- he doesn't control it.

 

He's behind her in his human form as she's on her way to the bedroom, and she doesn't say anything, waiting to see if he'll turn around on his own or if she'll have to remind him to sleep on the couch. 

 

But he stops in the doorway, like the precedent nights, and remains there for a moment while she gets into bed, then turns around and goes back to the living-room. 

 

The couch creaks under his weight -then everything is silent again.

 

She can't sleep, but she's not worried -although it takes him more time as days go by, she doesn't doubt that he'll arrive sooner and later in the shape of a cat.

 

Almost two hours later, she doesn't hear the sound of four small paws crossing the apartment, but the much heavier steps of a hesitant man approaching in the dark. 

 

She turns, bracing herself on an elbow. He stops in the doorway. 

 

He speaks right away, used to always find her awake by then.

 

"I, I---I can't..." he hesitates, searching for words, his voice barely above a murmur, as if to not disturb the silence. "I've tried to transform back but I... can't ---it doesn't work."

 

He seems anxious as he waits for her reaction, but she doesn't give him the one he's hoping for.

 

"Why are you telling me this?" she asks softly.

 

She knows why. He's hoping she'll make an exception and accept him in this shape in her bed. But what good are rules for if all they do is break them or find a way around them?

 

He stays silent, arms at his sides. 

 

Then turns around and pads back to the couch without a word. 

 

By some miracle, she manages to fall asleep three hours later -then wakes up around four a.m., with a heavy cat sprawled on her front.

 

Overall, he acclimates well ---so well, in fact, that the casual intimacy between them seems to grow overnight and without a sound, as if it had always been there.

 

He starts asking her about her day, and if the first times she doesn't elaborate, she quickly takes the habit of venting to him, a  _lot_ , too much -about all the ways her life at work is hell, all the ways her superiors are insufferable imbeciles who keep telling her how to do a job she's been doing for the past ten years.

 

And although Benjamin has shown by then that he's aware what a salary is, what making a living means, what rent and bills are, she senses at the way he worries at the inside of his cheek while listening to her, that there might still be a small part of him wondering why she'd rather put herself through that kind of ordeal, instead of staying home with him and let him smother her with his unconditional affection. 

 

He learns fast. He's earnest. He's obedient, and willing. 

 

Two months into this, and their life together feels secure, safe,  _comfortable_  -to her  _and_  to him, so much that he touches her more and more, however briefly, holding her hand and letting it go right away, nuzzling the crown of her head, pulling her to him for a moment when she comes home.

 

 

More importantly, she lets him.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ["Touch, touch](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Gkhol2Q1og)  
> I remember touch  
> Where do I belong?  
> I need something more in my mind
> 
> Pictures came with touch  
> A painter in my mind  
> Tell me what you see
> 
> A tourist in a dream  
> A visitor it seems  
> A half-forgotten song  
> Where do I belong?
> 
> Tell me what you see  
> I need something more
> 
> Kiss, suddenly alive  
> Happiness arrive  
> Hunger like a storm  
> How do I begin?
> 
> A room within a room  
> A door behind a door  
> Touch, where do you lead?
> 
> I need something more."
> 
>  
> 
> The next chapter will be up in two days <3


	10. Doubts and bashfulness

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> People! Check out [this cute-ass fanart by skerft! =D ](https://twitter.com/skerft1/status/1103008357840011264)
> 
> remember when I told you the next chapter would be up two days later? it was a lie
> 
> Sorry for that. Hope you enjoy it all the same <3

 

 

Rey used to want to go home because being home meant she wasn't at work, essentially.

 

It's different now. 

 

In fact even  _working_  is more bearable, now that she has someone to go home to.

 

Life feels safe, comfortable, and there are telling signs that Benjamin feels that way too. 

 

For one, he starts demanding his due. A few times, he claims to be deserving of a spoon of  _crème fraîche_  and taps on the door of the fridge, however tentatively, instead of obediently waiting for her to decide he's merited some. And after two months, the spoiled brat now  _expects_  his hair to be played with when she watches T.V.

 

He also starts  _sassing her._

 

It's subtle. Gradual.

 

While they're preparing dinner one night, she shows him how to check if an egg has gone bad by letting it sink -or float- in a glass of water, and because he listens with great attention, when she's done she doesn't expect him  _at all_  to mutter a quiet  _"I know that"_  that she almost doesn't catch -when they both know he most definitely  _didn't_  know that.

 

Another evening she goes out of the bathroom to find him drinking a very big glass of milk, because she made the mistake of leaving the bottles outside of the fridge. 

 

He's gulping it down, not even savoring it. 

 

"That's the first and the last. You'll be sick if you drink more," she mumbles, heading to the sink to put away the dishes he washed while she was at work. 

 

"No I won't," she hears behind her. She stops in her tracks.

 

_Did she hear that right?_

 

She turns around; he's not challenging her per se, but she still feels the need to insist: " _You will_ , actually."

 

He _shrugs._

 

The impertinence.

 

She walks over to him, and he opposes no resistance when she casually takes the bottle from his hands to put it away in the fridge -where it'll be safe from him. 

 

"Can I have a hug, then?"

 

She blinks, then looks up at him. 

 

_What's going on tonight?_

 

She wonders if he didn't let her take the bottle to bargain with her right after.

 

He's clueless most of the time -that doesn't mean he's clueless  _all_  the time.

 

She holds his gaze:

 

"--what does that have to do with anything?"

 

"I've been good," he states, presenting his case.

 

She snorts.

 

" _So?_  ----you feel like it means I owe you a hug?"

 

He pauses, apparently oblivious to the rhetorical nature of the question he's considering ---before he simply concludes:

 

"...no, but I'd like to have one."

 

Now the request is simple enough. 

 

\--but she doesn't know why, her heart beats faster.

Louder.

 

He, meanwhile, doesn't seem to be aware of what he's done to her in the slightest. He's just waiting to see if he'll get to be hugged.

 

She doesn't get it --it's really not a big deal. He holds her in his arms  _daily_ , even though he never dares to abuse of the privilege. And it certainly never happens for no reason at any time of the day.

 

He'll hold her when she leaves for work, when she comes home, or when she goes to bed - _when it makes sense._ And she lets him. 

 

She never expressly forbade him to touch her. If a lot of the time he hasn't, despite that he constantly wants to, it's always been because he was sensing that there were times where he shouldn't. 

  

Here, it feels different in every way. He doesn't have to ask every time he touches her, he knows that, because he does touch her every day without asking, and she lets him. Not need to stage it.

 

Pressing him against her, his chest under her cheek, tucked under his chin like he tucks himself under hers when he's a cat, her arms around his waist, she wonders if he's not in fact able to feel her heartbeat resonate through his own rib cage. If not, better let go before he does.

 

"Happy?"

 

"Yes."

 

Later that week, during one of her day off, she's finally taking care of the magazines she piled up with the years on the two highest shelves of her living-room, ending up rearranging the entire bookcase, and he approaches behind her then stands there to look at what she's doing. They're both still in their pajamas -which, for him, means that he's wearing the clothes he always wears.

 

Without turning to him, she distractedly acknowledges his presence with a small  _"Kitty?"_  that he reacts to with a faint, non-committal hum.

 

Her hands are back in the air to reach the last shelf when he huffs, as if bored, then rests his forehead against the back of her head, like he often does. 

 

Then, he proceeds to tenderly fondle her braless breasts through her t-shirt, taking two generous handfuls, pressing gently with a sigh through his nose. 

 

Not for more than a second, though, because he  _immediately_  lets go when she  _chokes_   _at his audacity_ , her face burning instantly, her arms dropping to get his hands out of the way -she stammers, her voice hoarse: 

 

"Don't---  _touch my chest_  unless I expressly ask you to!"

 

It's clear that he doesn't get the purpose of this new rule, but he's used to following them even when he doesn't understand them, so even though he's confused, she's at least certain that he won't question it.

 

That is, until he casually pulls on the very loose neckline of her t-shirt to check what's underneath. 

 

She slaps his hand away, making him jump. 

 

_She can't believe this._

 

"--what did I  _just_  say??"

 

His eyes are round.

 

He's completely lost.

 

"To not touch them," he recites, clearly not getting how that's relevant -then frowning, before his eyes get even rounder: " _...I can't look at them either??"_

 

"Of course  _not_ ," she shoots back, narrowing her eyes, stunned by his bafflement.

 

"But I've already seen them?"

 

She gapes.

 

He's referring to the showers she took in front of her  _pet cat_  when she thought he was just that: a cat. 

 

But so far, he had never mentioned it, so she could pretend like it had never happened.

 

"I don't care!" she snaps, close to stomp her foot. 

 

Thankfully, he's become better at emotionally handling his missteps with her, so he doesn't take it too personally; although he does cast one last glance at  _them,_  as if he was a Jane Austen character and she'd just opposed his lawful union with her  _tits_ \--causing her cheeks to burn with a vengeance when she should be rolling her eyes.

 

The day pass as if nothing was out of the ordinary; he follows her around while she does the laundry, a bit of cleaning; for the most part, she just zones out with her laptop on her stomach; but the feeling of his hands on her lingers, making her avoid his eyes a few times -and stare at his hands too.

 

He, meanwhile, seems perfectly unbothered.

 

When she lets herself fall on the couch after dinner, he very predictably crawls to her and rests his head in her lap without a word, his doubts and bashfulness of the first nights long forgotten. 

 

To fuck with him, she often pretends like she doesn't know what he wants, and just stares at the T.V., as if she hadn't noticed the man crowding the couch and her lap. 

 

And as a remnant of his habits as a cat, instead of directly asking for it, he first wordlessly grabs her hand, rests it on his cheek and leaves it there, expecting her to take over.

 

When she doesn't take her eyes off the screen, her hand remaining immobile on his cheek, finally, he uses his words -but not too many.

 

_"Pet me."_

 

She looks down at him.

 

Gone is the demure kitty of their first evening.

 

She complies anyway; it'd be cruel to delay it any longer, knowing he essentially spends his life waiting for that moment of the day where he'll get to lie still and purr under her touch. 

 

If she was honest with herself, she'd also admit that her fingers itch to run through his hair. 

 

She pushes the dark locks away from his forehead, burying her hand under the curls, and he closes his eyes. Soon, her hands follow an instinctive pattern, and she absently traces the shape of his ear, her eyes back on the screen, squinting ever so slightly at the lights it projects on her. 

 

And right then, she gets lost in her thoughts trying to remember when was the last time someone played with  _her_  hair, none of the memories of her relationship with Roy being a scene like this one-- 

 

She ends up mumbling what was initially just meant to be a distant, private, inconsequential thought:

 

"...you know, just because I'm not a cat, doesn't mean I wouldn't like to be petted too."

 

She means that they could swap places once in a while -but when she looks down at him again, it's clear that there's been a misunderstanding.

 

He's scowling at her.

 

_"I've tried to pet your tits, you didn't let me."_

 

She feels her face burn all over again with a new intensity. Luckily, he doesn't seem to even notice that, or understand what it means.

 

She tries not to stammer as she retorts: 

 

"Some people would consider those to be  _private parts._ "

 

".. _.like someone's balls_. That's pretty private."

 

She opens her mouth wide, narrowing her eyes.

 

What. Is.  _Going. On._

 

\--the back talk is real. She's not used to it. 

 

He's obviously referring to the night they met, and how she lifted up his tail to see if he still had his testicles. 

 

A moment like this is a good time to quietly observe that if he's not exactly a human, he's certainly not just a cat -but more importantly,  _he's not a child_ , for all the genuine innocence he manifests at times.

 

She notices the way he looks at her, although she pretends not to.

 

When he's not paying attention, she looks at him the same way.

 

"I--just! --- _checked_   _if you had any_ , I didn't  _touch_   _them_!" She finally protests.

 

"...you can touch them."

 

His tone is so remarkably flat, his expression so perfectly blank, that she'll never know if this was ever meant to be a joke or not.

 

 _She_ 's less ambiguous: the sarcasm in her tone is as thick as can be: 

 

 _"Thanks_." 

 

She huffs through her nose, resisting the urge to cross her arms over her chest. She just leaves her hands in his hair, but clenched, and still, her attention back on the screen.

 

She shakes her head slightly, avoiding his eyes. "I was---thinking about--" she starts muttering, her voice swallowed by the commercials despite how low the volume of the T.V. is. 

 

She doesn't finish her sentence.

 

But if he's oblivious about most things, Benjamin cannot be more attentive to  _her_.

 

Right then, he doesn't need her to explain anything.

 

She feels the hair on her arms stand up as he delicately takes her hand, and covers his mouth with it. His lips gently press against her palm, his thumb brushes the inside of her wrist. 

She swallows, her eyes still on the screen as she feels his mouth kiss its way up her fingers, his own hand lightly squeezing hers as he moves it over his lips--

 

She's up croaking  _goodnight_  before she even realizes what she's doing, and rushes to her bedroom, leaving him there. 

 

He doesn't attempt to follow her.

 

She hurries to get under the covers and stops moving, willing her heart to calm down. 

 

After a minute, she hears him turn the T.V. off. A month ago, it wouldn't even have crossed his mind.

 

Alone in the dark she stupidly, bitterly regrets not being able to let him know how happy she is with his progress.

 

How happy she is with him. 

 

She's truly amazed at how a situation so surreal has so quickly turned into something so domestic. It felt so out of control, at one point.

 

Sure, she's the one who let a cat inside her home. 

 

But she didn't have to put up with the human it turned into.

 

The truth is, even while stomaching the shock of the first days, she didn't consider even once the possibility of asking him to leave.

 

Since he's first appeared as a human to her, she's acted like she  _had_  to keep him. She's acted like she had no choice.

 

\--it was easier than admitting to herself that she was actually making one. 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Cause it's cold outside / When you coming home? / Cause it's hot inside / Isn't that enough? / I'm not in love / I'm not in love / I'm not in love](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=32udqal_lyQ)


	11. Tease

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey people =)
> 
> 1)  
> Several of you asked me about Benjamin's age. According to Rey, "She could have sworn he was about her age. Now she's not so sure."
> 
> Given the context in that chapter, the "now she's not so sure" part means he could be younger.
> 
> That's all we know about his age, so to give you an idea, he looks somewhere between his late twenties and early thirties.
> 
> 2)  
> [Also! skerft is back at it again with a fanart <3 Check it out!! =D](https://twitter.com/skerft1/status/1103820743291400192)
> 
> 3)  
> I read every comment like I might die tomorrow. They truly make life worth living, I don't care what anybody says -so thank you =')

 

Benjamin's progress isn't slowing down.

 

He finds distractions of his own. His appetite for the world is confined to Rey's apartment, as he still refuses to go outside -a small part of him still fearing he might not be allowed back in- but his curiosity is candid and ever-growing nonetheless. It shows in many ways. 

 

And while in the beginning Rey was involved a lot, she soon lets go, stands there and watches.

 

First, he stops acting like her second shadow, watching her every move, following her everywhere, systematically putting her at the center of his  _constant, insistent, undivided attention_. Such a welcome change. 

 

He still undoubtedly prefers being in the same room as her, and remains very vocal about his discomfort at the sight of a closed door, especially between him and her. But his whole world isn't narrowed down to the limits of her being anymore.  

 

Ironically, that particular change starts with him digging up relics from her past, when he goes through every cardboard box she keeps in the  _office-storeroom_  with an avid intensity, then scatters their contents on the living-room floor to sit in the middle of it -books, magazines, comics, CDs and VHS she cherished as a kid.

 

The first time she comes home to him in the middle of her stuff, she waits to see if she's going to feel angry about it, but she's not even annoyed. He's sitting legs crossed on the floor, and she just tells him when he looks up at her:

 

"You'll put everything back where you found it --alright?"

 

Then she lets her eyes wander over the mess. Her  _Goosebumps_  novels. Her TLC, Bjork, Cranberries, Lauryn Hill albums. Her  _Seventeen_  magazines. The series  _Confessions of Georgia Nicolson_  - the second volume,  _It's OK, I'm wearing really big knickers_ , is right there in his hand.

 

Most of it, she bought it with the monthly allowance her grandfather started giving her when she turned ten, to make sure she wouldn't die of boredom during the endless afternoons she spent alone in her room.

 

She feels dizzy. 

 

She hasn't thought about any of this in  _years._ When Roy and her broke up, she had to carry all of it during her move. She's never known why she persists in keeping any of it. Already when they moved in together, Roy had suggested that she could get rid of some of it. Despite her apparent detachment, she hadn't -and she's still not getting rid of it today, though she really should.  

 

Every day, Benjamin finds interest in something new among the old things she's kept; and every day, she's reminded of all the years that have gone by; but also the future she dreamt of having, without ever pursuing it; the sheer amount of life and spirit she's wasted away at the local grocery store in  _Average Town USA_.

 

It stings, and it hurts, but not to the point that she stops him. 

 

Traveling through time, as if catching up on everything he could have missed while he was a cat, like a cheap version of the  _Fifth Element_ , Benjamin chases clues about what it's like to be a part of humanity, striving to remember what being a human -a teenage girl, in this case- means on a deep level, casually diving into her soul. 

 

This  _Leeloo Dallas_  didn't land on the roof of a flying cab, but in her bathtub. One day, Rey will come home, and he'll be able to speak five languages.

Then he'll leave her to save the world aboard a spaceship.

 

The thought, however silly, actually causes her to attack the skin of her bottom lip.

 

She's  _moved_  to see a man being that completely, that unironically absorbed by a culture the society at large dismisses as unimportant; and she's  _excited_  to see him as entranced by it as an archeologist would be by legitimate discoveries ---but she also feels  _powerless_. 

 

Anxious.

 

She finds herself split between wanting him to completely and entirely bloom to life as a human --and dreading the day it'll happen. Because who's to say what exactly will happen, the day it inevitably happens?

 

The day he needs more, and she can't give it? 

 

Seeing him learning and ingesting everything he can, with the kind of appetite she doesn't have anymore, and that he seems to have in scary quantities, ultimately reminds her of her own admitted inadequacy--

\--of how at thirty-three she's given up, and going nowhere, how she'll forever be no one, how there are no opportunities to take anymore, not in the world she lives in.

 

She tries to not be a threat to his enthusiasm and stays quiet, sometimes seeing it all through his eyes and getting a glimpse of genuine wonder -or some other feelings she hardly ever gets to have anymore- while her sadness shudders right beneath the surface, hidden away from him.

 

She also tries not to be colder than she means to him as a result.

 

In those moments, she can't understand anymore how there has ever been a time when she doubted he was real. His being feels so tangible to her as he's humbly kneeling in the middle of her past, or lying on the floor with her earphones on, listening to whatever CD was in the  _Walkman_  he found with the rest. 

 

Then, his hunger spreads beyond the storeroom: for better or for worse, he starts paying attention to what's on T.V.

 

Nothing and no one can stand between his head and her lap, so their habits in the evening remain pretty much the same; but when she's on her laptop lying on the couch during a day off, her headphones on, for instance, she'll sometimes find that he turned the T.V. on -and is watching  _Keeping up with the Kardashians_.

 

She observes on him the same unwavering focus than with the rest; he's true to himself, frowning as he listens to what Kourtney has to say for herself.

 

Other changes are more subtle. Despite how juvenile his interests and his behavior might sometimes be, he starts acting his age in more ways than one -first by taking initiatives.

 

So while he still craves her approval and finds a great satisfaction in just following her rules, he now also tries to anticipate her demands, and her needs -or more neutrally, what their home needs.

 

She's surprised and not in a bad way when she finds a grocery list on the fridge one day, the items on it neatly written in cursive and chosen well, matching what's needed -with the exception of the six jars of  _crème fraîche_  she finds at the bottom of the list.

 

There's not just food on it either, but also a few cleaning products -or other necessities, like toilet paper. 

 

Not ten minutes later, she finds out that he's cleaned the bathtub and the sink in the bathroom, understanding that he had access to the products needed because she unintentionally left the cupboards open. 

  

\--something she  _intentionally_  does from that moment on.

 

Although he has a better grasp of his responsibilities as a  _roomie_ , and as an adult, he doesn't try to deny and hide that undying part of him that longs for her affection; he embraces it, the cat in him stretching in the sun when she runs her fingers in his hair. 

 

His transformations, meanwhile, are rarer still, and if he happens to be a cat when she comes home, he runs to her and practically jumps in her arms, enjoying the  _hence_  equally rare opportunities he has to bask in her warmth. 

 

With time, though, she gets a few  _hints_ that his fondness for her grows into something else.

 

Many things made her aware of it before, but it was easy - _possible_  at least- to ignore or deny it, something she can't do any longer after he first puts into words his---  _feelings._

 

One instance in particular takes her aback -especially because she's still in a haze when it happens, sipping her scalding tea at the table across him while he's eating a generous bowl of cereal -with milk, naturally.

 

It's that early in the morning, when she's unsuspecting and at her most vulnerable, that he casually tells her between two mouthfuls: 

 

"I was hard thinking of you last night."

 

\--mug at her lips, she coughs into her tea, effectively burning her tongue.

 

She groans and hisses for a minute, wincing, her hand covering her mouth, eyeing him as he finishes his breakfast, unbothered.

 

Is there even a way to handle this delicately?

 

Should she even care with him, given that he doesn't seem to understand how some people might have kept this information a secret? Unless he knows this, and just doesn't care? 

 

She waits for him to finish gulping down the sugary milk left in his bowl, his head tilted back and his adam's apple bobbing -then she finally speaks. 

 

"Well?" she starts, clearing her throat, "Do you agree, now, that it's nice to be able to sleep separately and have some privacy?"

 

He looks at her, licking his lips, somewhat confused. 

 

"...no."

 

Of course. Privacy might be the one concept that'll forever remain foreign to him. 

 

"I was really hard this morning too."

 

 _Wow_. 

 

She tries to swallow down the heat she feels in her cheeks, her lips pursed, then comments dryly: "Thank you for keeping me up to date on your morning wood."

 

"You're welcome."

  

She's quick to dismiss the incident as unimportant. 

 

Yet despite her best effort, her mind repeatedly wanders back to it that day -insistently even -and many times again during the week that follows.

 

She catches herself picturing him lying on the couch a  _lot --_ his boxers straining while he stares at it, at a loss of what to do with it, waiting for it to go away ---and for some reason  _that_  mental image is what makes her  _squirm_. 

 

For him, life goes on -at least, he doesn't behave any differently around her.

 

She'll admit to herself that she should have known better than to think that this was just a bump in the road, as one morning she wastes ten precious minutes searching her wardrobe, then the bathroom, then the washing machine -before giving up. She finds him in the kitchen.

 

He's at the sink, conscientiously filling the tea-pot for her.

 

She's not too angry, but she's in a hurry. She doesn't have that much time in the morning in the first place -so she goes straight to the point.

 

"Where are they?"

 

He's as genuinely oblivious as ever when he turns to her, his mouth still in a sort of sleepy pout, his hair in his eyes.

"What--?"

 

_"Where are my bras?"_

 

That wakes him up.  _She fucking knew it._

 

He blinks rapidly, then swallows -then surprises her when instead of answering her like the obedient pet he's always been, he  _hesitates_. 

 

"I... wha-"

 

And  _God knows_  she doesn't have time for this sudden change. 

 

" _We are the only two people living here_ , Benjamin. Things don't just disappear.  _Where are they?"_

 

He seems to come back to his senses, nodding once, but  _then---_

 

"...what do you need them for?"

 

She can't believe this. She is  _not_  about to give one by one all the reasons why she needs her bras!

 

"It doesn't matter, they're  _mine!_ "

 

She only has five of those. She can't afford her pet hiding any of them. 

 

It must have been progressive; he must have taken one, then two, then three --all without her noticing. But she had to notice at some point. 

 

Tone deceptively calm, she attacks the problem from a different angle, insisting on each word.

 

"I'll  _maybe_ consider not taking away some of your privileges if you tell me  _now_  where they are."

 

Yet again, what he mutters next isn't what she wants to hear. 

 

"Which privileges?"

 

Silly boy. He's trying to weight out his options, see if he can sacrifice his right to watch T.V. or access the storeroom. But that is not what she meant by  _privileges_.

 

She steps closer to him, chin up -her voice dropping dangerously low. 

 

"---don't even think about laying your head in my lap ever again if my bras aren't in my hand in the next twenty seconds."

 

His eyes widen briefly at the thought. Finally, he breathes it out: 

 

"In the blue pillow."

 

She presses her lips tight, fixing him with a glare, then turns her head toward the couch on the other side of the room. More specifically at the pillow there, the one he uses to sleep at night. 

 

She crosses the room in no time, and zips it open. 

 

They're in there, each and every one of them, neatly folded.

 

She looks back at him. 

 

He's standing right where she left him, by the counter. Passively watching as she inspects the bras.  _He didn't do anything to them, did he?_

 

But no, after a closer look, she can see that he didn't. She still brings them to her nose to check how they smell just in case, only getting the familiar scent of her laundry detergent.

 

Only when she's in the bathroom, putting one on, does she suddenly understand the whole point of this. 

 

The little shit just prefers her without a bra. 

 

Oh _,_  she's so ---pissed, she really is. 

 

It certainly doesn't affect her in any other way.

 

And if the next day she chooses not to wear any bra, it's only because it's her day off and that  _it's obviously more comfortable -_ and  _not_  because the man she lives with will be able to better recognize the soft swells of her breasts through the very thin fabric of the tank top she just so happens to wear that day. 

 

He's the one showcasing his legs all day long. 

 

 

The tease.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [It's always around me, all this noise / But not nearly as loud as the voice saying / "Let it happen, let it happen / (It's gonna feel so good) / Just let it happen, let it happen"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vu_bCmI5awE)
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> Once again, the chapter was originally twice as long, but instead of getting you all used to long ass chapters that early on in the story, I cut it in half -and the good news is you won't have to wait long for the second half! Two days at most (I mean it this time). 
> 
> I hope you enjoyed it <3


	12. The love of a pet cat can be unconditional, the love of a human never is

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...guess who lied about that update again?
> 
> god, I'm not treating you people right
> 
> also this chapter is yet again way longer than I thought it'd be 
> 
> I hope you'll like it <3

 

Rey monitors Benjamin's progress toward his human self, and it makes her dizzy. 

 

One instant her heart swells, full, content, the next she stops to wonder where it will all end up leading. 

 

Wary of what the next step will be; and the next step after that -and the one after that.

 

Trying to not remind herself over and over that if the love of a pet cat can be unconditional, the love of a human never is.

 

For her, at this point, it's all about not giving in to the idea that a day will inevitably come when he won't need her anymore. The thought leaves her restless. 

In the process, she admits to herself that she doesn't really mind him needing her.  

 

The real issue, in fact, is that she can't deny anymore how much  _she's_  started to need  _him_ _._  

 

How impatient she is to go home, knowing that he's waiting for her. How better she feels once she's told him about her day, because he's always listening her talk about her passive-agressive fights with customers and the pressure her superiors put her under like he's a journalist for the BBC, and she's a refugee from a dictatorship, giving an interview that'll be edited in a documentary meant for the whole world to see. 

 

And sometimes, she wishes she hadn't become dependent on him herself, relying on the comfort he brings her to a degree that's somehow much less reparable in her eyes than him relying on her to open doors. 

 

There's no way for her to ignore that what he doesn't know, he can learn from anybody. What he gives her, on the other hand, she feels like she's never got it from anyone before him. 

What happens the day he's grown tired of hearing her complain about her petty life at the grocery store, like anyone would? 

 

No one wants to hear about her thoughts and feelings on what she considers to be evil methods of management.  _Only a man who reads her Seventeen magazines would find that interesting_ , a traitorous voice adds, her bitterness over all of this not even letting her love that about him in peace.

 

She tries not to think about any of it. She tries not to let it weigh on whatever it is they share.

 

She feels stupid.

  

To not trouble the fragile domestic bliss they live in, she keeps those ruminations hidden from him -until she discovers that Benjamin has concerns of his own.

 

Up until that moment, although he's never hidden the fact that he hates it, he's never once challenged her decision to make him sleep on the couch.

 

It's been a tacit agreement between them that he has permission to join her in the bed if he turns into a cat first -and at that point, because his transformations are rarer, he hasn't slept in her bed in a month. 

 

That morning, when she comes out of the bathroom and joins him in the kitchen to prepare her tea, he apparently decides that it's lasted long enough. 

 

"Kitty--" is all she can hum at him before he comes to stand right next to her by the counter and cuts her off. 

 

"I don't sleep well on the couch."

 

At the way he says it out of nowhere, she suspects that he's thought about it for a while, and that he even might have had to gather some courage to bring it up. 

 

That he's anxious over the possible outcome of this conversation.

 

She feigns casualness, but the statement has her immediately pay great attention to what might come next.

 

If he had a say in this, they'd both be lying around all day, in the bed or on the couch, her hands in his hair, his head comfortably resting between her tits while he plays with them, pawing at them until he falls asleep. 

 

Without looking up from the bag of tea she's dipping in her mug, she innocently asks: "...you don't?"

 

She knows he means that he doesn't sleep well without her, whether that's completely true or not -and she's curious to see what his approach is going to be. 

 

She's not disappointed. 

 

"My neck hurts."

 

He can't see it, but she first wordlessly quirks an eyebrow, still looking down at her tea. Then, she turns to him. 

 

"Where."

 

He wasn't expecting this.

Timidly, he lifts a hand to the side of his neck with a soft: "Here..."

 

She gently removes his hand, acting all concerned, then carefully presses and rolls the pads of her fingers over the muscles there with a serious frown on her face.  

 

She can feel how hopeful he is, his eyes searching her face while she pretends to focus on his nape, when really all she can pay attention to is how sweetly docile he is. 

And how good he smells. 

 

"Can you turn your head...?" she asks softly, slowly guiding his chin left, then right.

 

He follows her movements, eyes down, letting out a small  _yes_. Unwilling to go further into the lie.

 

He slowly exhales and looks into her eyes again. She pretends to think about it for a handful of seconds, cocking her head -then sighs and brings the mug to her lips. 

 

"You're right. The couch is too small for you."

 

He goes very still.

 

"Yes... it is," he cautiously confirms -and it's not a lie. It'd be fair for him to sleep where he can fully stretch his legs.

  

He briefly closes his eyes when she pushes a few locks away from his face. Then she steps away from the counter with her tea.

 

"I'll take it, and you take the bed," she concludes, sitting down at the table. She runs a hand over her face, tired before she's even left for work. 

 

Because he's very quiet, she looks up at him. 

  

He's still where she left him, his hand on the counter, looking at her, until he lowers his eyes, staring somewhere in front of him, swallowing.

There's nothing he can counter that with. 

 

"You'll sleep better that way," she sheepishly offers.

 

His silence at that causes her chest to tighten in an unexpected way, but before she gives him another poor excuse, she hears him surrender with a quiet _thank you_ that does nothing to make her feel better.

 

Is he going to spend his day thinking of other arguments in favor of them both sleeping in the bed together?

 

However ridiculous it is, she can't look right at him when he seems hurt over it.

 

When she leaves, though, she affectionately runs her hand in his hair ----and he's grateful for it nonetheless.

 

But that day was bound to be a particular milestone anyway, she finds.

 

At work, several of her colleagues ask her confirmation that she'll join them after closing the store for a few drinks at a bar in town, because today's José's birthday.

 

If the number of people invited was smaller, she'd be really surprised to be invited at all.

 

But in this case the whole team has been made aware of it, and everyone is talking about it. Her absence would not only be noticed, but also, for all that those people don't know much about her despite seeing her every day, they know her enough that they'd be very doubtful of her having any other plan on a weeknight.

 

And as a floor manager, not showing up for as much as a single drink to celebrate the birthday of a colleague you worked with for seven years doesn't look good. 

 

Those are very good reasons to go even if she doesn't really want to, but the truth is, in addition to all of that, she's actually curious to know what it feels like to have a glimpse of that kind of spontaneous, casual social life again.

 

She doesn't know where she stands compared to others. Do people do this a lot, past twenty-three? Just go out, and have drinks with their colleagues?

 

The bar isn't too busy -they never are, around here, especially not on a week day- and in their small group everybody talks over everyone else. She tries to follow a conversation at a time, and fails -still, she's surprised with herself when she doesn't run out of there after her first drink.

 

The whole time, her mind keeps wandering back to Benjamin.

 

...what book did he read today? What sitcom did he discover?

 

What is he watching right now? Did he cook something tonight?

 

Ultimately, her worry over appearances aren't enough to keep her away from someone who's relentlessly been appreciative of her presence, and tirelessly grateful for it -whether she deserves it or not.

 

She can't claim to be friends with any of those people; sitting down with them that night just confirms it. She knows nothing of their private lives, not that she cares to. 

And they know nothing of hers -not that there's much to know. 

 

She stands up.

 

"Hubby asking you back home?"

 

Rey frowns, glancing around to find the owner of the voice. Her eyes fall on Lisa, sitting two tables away. 

 

"Boyfriend," corrects Jared between them, before turning to Rey. "Roy, is it?"

 

Rey is too stunned to say anything right away.

Roy and her have broken up almost  _two years ago_.

 

"Yeah," she breathes, cheeks flushed, before vaguely waving at them all, although most of them don't pay any attention to her: "See you all tomorrow. Don't drink too much."

 

"See you Jones," she hears behind her as she walks away.

 

It's already late enough that she sees no other drivers on the road. Climbing the last steps to her apartment thirty minutes later, she checks the time on her phone.

 

It's not  _too_  late, all things considered, but she's still aware that she's never come home at that hour.

 

For selfish reasons, she hopes her kitty isn't already asleep, and once at the door she listens closely if the T.V. is on, on the other side of it; but it's completely silent.

 

So just in case, she's careful to be as quiet as possible while getting her keys out -then opens the door. 

 

And she's right to think he's asleep. All the lights are off, and waiting in the dark doing nothing is a quirk he gave up months ago. 

 

She'll go straight to bed after her shower, then.

 

Trying not to make a sound, she turns the light of the hallway on and carefully takes her shoes off -then her anorak, slowly zipping it open to hang it at the wall near the door.  

 

She doesn't know yet that Benjamin is actually silently standing right behind her, in his boxer briefs and his sweatshirt, eyes squinting as they're getting used to the light.

 

And when she turns to him, she jumps with a resounding shout.

 

"God---fucking--Jesus Christ _fuck_ ," she hisses, a hand flat over her heart.

 

"...where were you?"

 

She's heard that question so many times in movies and T.V. shows. She's used to it being the trigger of dramatic fights between married people; she's used to the tone being one of suspicion and distrust.

 

 

That's not what she's dealing with here. If he was mad, it'd be a first. And he isn't. 

 

He's being as genuine as ever, confused like he's been many times before, but more importantly, his brow is furrowed with concern.

 

"I was at a bar with colleagues," she calmly explains, letting her bag drop to the ground. 

 

There's a short silence as he follows her to the kitchen, until she hears him insist with a hesitant:

"I --I was worried." 

 

She needs a broth or something.. 

"It wasn't planned, or I would have told you" she distractedly assures him while taking a bowl out of the cupboard. "I wasn't supposed to stay that long."

 

She fills the kettle up, and he comes to stand next to her, watching her, arms at his sides. Seemingly needing more from her. 

 

"What is that in your hand?" She absentmindedly asks when she sees the t-shirt she wore to sleep in his fist.

 

"Your t-shirt."

 

Her eyes on the bouillon cube she's crushing in her bowl with a spoon, she asks again: 

"I know, but what did you need it for?" 

 

"...I was smelling it," he tells her simply, unashamed. 

 

She's sure he would let anyone know.

 

She finally looks up from her bowl then, feeling a smile tug at her lips.

 

But he's not smiling.  

 

As if seizing the opportunity, now that her attention is on him, he stammers: "I, I was---I waited for you all day."

  

It doesn't sound like a reproach.

Just a statement.

 

As in: he actually waited for her all day. She swallows, careful as she finally understands that something really needs to be discussed in his eyes. And in theory, it'd be more than fine to discuss anything that causes him to be unhappy, but in this particular case, what is there to say?

 

Does he even know what is bothering him?

 

"I--You could have told me," he tries again -repeating the words she said to him not a minute earlier, as if unable to come up with anything better.

 

But she meant that she would have told him if she knew she'd come home late  _before_  leaving for work, not  _after_ , because:

 

"How?" she asks, trying to be delicate. "...Give you a call? You don't have a phone."

 

She points that out the softest way possible, yet it's as if she could see the cat in him flinch with her own eyes. As if she told him that to point out that he's lacking something. 

 

He blinks a few times, searching for words. 

 

As absurd as it sounds, the idea that a human without a phone isn't a proper human is what seems to hit him -most likely for reasons bigger than that.

 

"Baby?" she tries --but the kettle hisses, and she brings her attention back on it. 

 

She pours the water in her bowl, then stirs it.

 

When she turns around, he's sitting on a chair. The t-shirt laid on his lap, he's looking down at it, slowly feeling the fabric. 

  

"Did you eat?"

 

He gives a small shake of his head, his eyes not leaving the shirt. 

  

"...how come?" she asks softly, stepping closer. 

 

He ignores her question:

 

"You---can come home when you want, I...I just would like to know --when."

 

She barely hears the last word. As he says it, he appears to understand that he's not bringing new elements to light.

 

To try to appease him, she still says  _alright_ to that, waiting for him to stop staring at her shirt and look up at her. 

 

But he doesn't. 

 

He suddenly stands up with a quiet and rushed  _goodnight_ , and heads to the living-room. Taking the t-shirt with him.

 

"Uh--goodnight," she stammers, blinking as she watches him go to the other side of the room, to the couch; then as he lies down on his side there, before going very still.

 

It's all done in a matter of seconds.

 

This doesn't feel right at all. 

 

But after a moment, she sits down, puzzled, then defensively thinks to herself that whatever this is, a good night sleep will fix it -and it's likely that she's right. 

 

Objectively speaking, nothing major has happened. She just came home later than usual.

 

She stirs her broth, quietly takes a few sips, trying to ignore how tight her throat is getting.

 

Not a minute go by before she turns her head back toward the living-room and stares at the dark.

 

Shouldn't she say something? It feels like she should say something.

 

Wouldn't it be nice for her to say something?

 

But then, she would need to know what there is to say. 

 

And she doesn't. 

 

But there she is, padding to the living-room, somehow unsure and determined at the same time.

 

Approaching him she sees that he's facing the back of the couch, turned away from her.

  

She nervously clears her throat. She doesn't know what to say, so she goes for:

 

"...we said you'd sleep in the bed tonight, and I'd take the couch?"

 

He turns his head to the side.

 

\---then obeys her without a word and without thinking twice, getting up to walk past her, in direction to the bedroom.  

 

She stands there in the silence of the room.

Alone.

 

Back to square one.

 

She's not guilty of anything.

 

But if she knows something of him, it's that he's not able to manipulate anybody, for all the bras he hides. Although she doesn't completely understand why, and that he doesn't seem to understand why either, there is no doubt to her that he's genuinely hurt.

 

And she hates this. Whether or not she's actually responsible for it, she wants it to stop.

 

So after five long minutes of standing in the middle of her living-room, she finally advances in the corridor. Without warning, her heart doubles its pace. 

 

Pushing the door further open, she barely makes any sound, but he still hears her, because she sees his silhouette as he props himself on his elbow and twists slightly to look at her, most likely surprised that she's here.

 

Then, before she can step closer or say anything, either because he thinks he misunderstood her and that he was actually not supposed to go sleep here, or because he thinks she simply changed her mind, he starts to shift to get out of bed, like the docile, respectful soul that he is -but she stops him before he even has the time to sit up. 

 

"Lie down."

 

He goes very still in the dark, stunned, hesitating -not in defiance, but probably because he's wondering if he heard her right.  

 

Her bare feet across the floor hardly produce any sound at all on her way to the bed, the mattress then barely moving under her weight as she crawls to him. 

 

Right then, he lies back down on his side, warily -barely allowing himself to breathe as she gets closer, closer--

 

\--slowly, she lowers herself and wraps an arm around his shoulders, feeling a slight shudder under her palm when her hand finds his chest. Her body tentatively shifts so she's pressed against his back, his warmth making her breath stutter, her nose instinctively finding the curve of his nape.

 

She breathes on his skin, her heart pounding, feeling his body tense against her.

 

Then, she very hesitantly presses her lips there, coaxing a muffled sound from him.    

 

She almost doesn't hear him when he says:

 

"I'm sorry."

 

Blindly apologizing to her. 

 

Her arm tightens around him, her brow furrowed with worry.

 

"Baby," she softly says to him, her hand moving up to his hair, "...what are you sorry for?"

 

Nothing comes for a long moment.

 

"I don't know," he finally admits, defeated.

  

She first feels the very real urge to tell him that _she's_ the one who's sorry -but instead, she snuggles closer to him, hiding her face in his neck. 

 

Embracing the way he melts against her when she murmurs on his skin that she missed him.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [My body is a cage / that keeps me from dancing with the one I love / But my mind holds the key](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jdve08cG3pE)
> 
> I'm leaving my apartment today, and I'll be back on Wednesday. It means that I have no idea when I'll be able to update, because I don't know if I'll have the chance to write at all where I'm going. Hopefully, I'll have updated by next Friday. 
> 
> Also I don't know if you've noticed, but there's no way this fic is only going to be 15 chapters long.
> 
> Take care of yourselves <3<3<3


	13. Summer in the middle of winter

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Very brief recap: Rey allowed Benjamin in her bed as a human for the first time after she came home later than usual. They fell asleep together, with her spooning him and telling him she missed him.
> 
> I missed you people. I hope you'll enjoy this chapter.
> 
> (Also letting you know that: not a single comment ever goes unnoticed.  
> I read every one of your comments, and like many other authors I often come back to reread them. I read them, I take note of your pseudonyms, and I recognize you when you've commented several times <3 it makes it all worth it)

 

 

 

Benjamin is standing in the middle of the living-room, squinting.

 

The crisp morning air makes the hair on his legs stand. He's not wearing his pants, and he wouldn't dare to admit it to her face, but it's not happening anytime soon. The window is wide open -so he stays away from it, even though he does it purely out of habit at this point.  

 

The shower is running in the bathroom, and while he's alone, he eyes the couch.

 

He has half a mind to throw that thing out the window. 

 

It'd certainly be nice if he was one piece of furniture away from the solution. Go back just like that to simpler times, when his place in the bed was secure; when his spot at her side hadn't been questioned yet. 

 

But if he's aware that he's not the smartest, he's not that stupid.

 

He doubts Mommy would be too happy about the couch disappearing.

 

She would maybe go as far as to sleep in the bathtub just to make a point. 

 

He's not as strong as her.

 

He can't pretend for a second that he wants to be anywhere but in her arms.

 

Last night, he fell asleep in the bed, those arms tight around him, her body pressed along his own for the first time in a long time -although he doesn't know in how long a time exactly. He's not paying attention to that.

 

All that matters now, and all he'll be thinking about all day, is if his night spent in the bed as a human is the sign of a new habit being established, or just the exception that proves the rule.

 

He exhales through his nose.

 

Behind him, on the other side of the bathroom door, the water stops running. 

 

He hasn't heard the alarm this morning, something that never happens even when he sleeps on the couch; and she left his side before he was fully awake. 

 

He doesn't know what to expect, and his heart is already beating faster as he waits for the door to open. Should he expect her to be mad because of how he behaved last night?

 

He clenches and unclenches his fists.

 

The door opens, with Rey on the other side of it.

 

She's still sleepy, he can tell. Many times before he's tried to get her to go back to bed, to make her see that she needed more sleep -and every time she's shaken her head, like he's being silly. 

 

More concerning, however, is how she walks past him in direction to the kitchen without a word. He looks at her go, his heart in his throat, frozen.

 

But just as he imagines the worst, she stops before entering the kitchen and turns to him.

 

"Kitty? ...Come."

 

Sheer relief pushes him forward.

 

She's whispered the words, as if any louder is too much that early in the morning. When she opens the fridge, he comes to stand right behind her to see what's inside, his eyes right above her head while she leaves him the time to choose what he wants.

 

Once she's made sure he's eaten, she leaves for work. 

 

Then the apartment is silent again. 

 

Of all the colors, smells, lights, sounds and tunes Benjamin has kept glimpses of through the years, the feeling that remains the most vivid to him is the fear that filled his rib cage one night, when someone lifted him off the wet grass by the skin of his neck -his claws defensively splayed in the air as he swings from the fox's mouth, his own mouth wide open to give mute, helpless snarls the whole time they cross the park.

 

_"So small, still, I thought you were just a rat."_

 

He calls her Mamma, but Mazvita is the name he remembers her by.

 

She and  _Mommy_  have a lot in common.

 

There are things he feels for Rey, though, that he definitely doesn't remember feeling for Mazvita. 

 

Regardless, it starts with the same longing.

 

Being cradled, held close, cooed to sleep; sprawled on a chest, rising and falling -fed, kissed, petted. Cared for, protected.

 

Then waiting, waiting, waiting for her to come home. Staring at a closed door.

 

When he morphs, it feels like the entire world morphs with him. Shapes, colors and time stretch, melt and blur with his own skin; and on his way from one half of his soul to the other, he sometimes loses track of what day it is, where he is, what shape he has. 

 

Where he belongs. 

 

God knows he'd like to say he has some control over this, but he really doesn't. Nobody taught him. 

 

When he turns into his smaller shape, he likes to think that Rey is the one turning into a giant. A supple, warm, _soft_ giant. 

 

He likes to recognize a face; a house on a hill; a picture; he likes to recognize  _her_  face; he likes when things feel  _familiar_. Patterns are helpful, schedules too. He checks the time a lot. 

 

He checks the clock on the nightstand; the clock above the fridge; the clock on the oven. 

 

He doesn't want to be thrilled; he hates changing his habits; he hates surprises.

 

He's disoriented often enough without unnecessarily adding to it. It takes time to find his feet in his own skin. When he hasn't been human in a while, becoming himself again doesn't happen overnight.  

 

Other consequences of his transformations are less dramatic.

 

One of those is that he's constantly bumping various parts of his body into all kinds of furniture.

 

All because he sometimes forgets himself while following Rey around -that he's too big, too large, and that he must balance his weight on two legs instead of four. 

 

He follows her blindly -and rams his foot into the dresser, his elbow into a doorknob, his shin into the coffee table. His head into a cupboard. 

 

Every time, Mommy flinches and exclaims words of sympathy: _"--Ooh!-"; "...Ouch!"; "...Kitty?"; "--Baby!"_

 

His hand covering his brow, wincing, he bends with a muffled grunt, waiting for her to push his hand away and calm the throb with her own palm and a quiet  _oof_.

 

He likes her. 

 

Benjamin finds out that he's also lost habits that are distinctively human, that some would say are even _key_ to being accepted as one. Wearing clothes again is a particular kind of challenge.  

 

The first time he puts on the ones Rey bought for him, he _tries_ to be good, to hide from her that he hates it, but she can tell anyway.

 

"Stop scowling."

 

He tries to take the sweatshirt off later on that day, while she's loading the washing machine -but she stops him with a look.

 

He shivers when unexpectedly, her hands run on his chest through the fabric. "It fits well. Doesn't it feel nice?" she asks, trying to be encouraging.

 

"Yes," he says, but he knows they're not talking about the same thing, because she withdraws her hands with a satisfied look on her face.

 

One afternoon, he finds on the backrest of the rocking chair in the left corner of the bedroom a soft, cream-colored wool sweater. It  smells exactly like her. He misses her terribly. 

 

He doesn't overthink it, and puts it on; the neck is blessedly wide, the sleeves much less: they strain around his biceps and only cover half of his forearms. 

 

It's even more uncomfortable than his own clothes, but this time, he doesn't mind it. He could almost pretend he's in her arms, curling against her belly. 

 

And before he knows it, he's curling on the bed, falling asleep in it. 

 

Even from across the apartment though, the sound of her keys jingling on the other side of the front door wakes him up. Eyes barely open he jumps and hurries out of the bedroom.

 

But Mommy's shocked expression once she's inside stops him before he's got a chance to claim his hug. 

 

 _"What are you wearing?"_  She drops her bag to the floor, appalled. "Take that off!"

 

He blinks, taken aback; then looks down and is effectively reminded that he put her sweater on. Feeling his face heat up with sudden guilt, he tries to delicately pull on the sleeves to take it off, avoiding her eyes.

 

She takes it from his hands once it's off, and looks at it, unable to hide her disappointment -the one thing he doesn't want to be the cause of. 

 

"You stretched it," she comments, holding up a sleeve. "...it was already too big for me."

 

An issue that sure hasn't crossed his mind. 

 

Clenching his fists hard, he unhelpfully stands there while she inspects it. Feeling stupid. She sighs, closing her eyes. "God..."

 

He opens his mouth to apologize, but she speaks before he does. "Where is your sweatshirt?"

 

The mention of his godawful clothes makes him look down and clench his jaw. She takes her coat off. 

 

"...where is it, Baby?" He hears her ask more softly.

 

He frowns. "It's--" ---but he goes quiet, then just turns around and leaves without another word to go find it. 

 

Her bag is on the kitchen table, and she's looking for something in it when he's back with his sweatshirt on. He wishes he could be small again right then. He stays a bit farther from her than usual, silently watching her. 

 

"Don't wear my clothes, they're not your size." 

 

Even though she's not looking at him, he nods, wincing. When she seems to have found what she was looking for, her hands still in the bag, she looks up at him. "Come here."

 

He hesitates just a second and crosses the distance between them. "Close your eyes ---just in case," she advises, as if he had any idea what she's talking about. 

 

He closes his eyes and flinches when he hears the sound of a spray -once, twice, three times before she lets him open his eyes with a soft  _there_.  

 

He wouldn't know what name to give the scent that fills his lungs then, but he recognizes it instantly, even more so as he sees her put the small bottle back in her bag. It's Rey,  _her_  scent, her perfume, the one she wears every day. 

 

Lowering his head he pulls on the neck of his sweatshirt to bury his mouth and his nose in the fabric and breathe it in.

 

Zipping her bag, she suggests a bit sheepishly: "...I can put some on your sweatshirts when they're clean from now on, if you want."

 

She always has the best ideas. 

 

His hand still holding his sweatshirt over his nose, he nods again and gives her a quiet and muffled: "Yes, please."

 

She acknowledges that with a nod, then stands there, her hands on the bag, pursing her lips. Hesitating. 

 

"...can I get my hug, now?"

 

 _She's the one asking that_. He didn't even know that was still on the table, and he's not about to give her the time to change her mind.

 

The next second his arms are around her shoulders, leaving her the room to circle his waist and pull him close. He feels her sigh against him.

 

Somehow, despite how undeserving he is sometimes, she's always good enough to give him affection. 

 

And he often thinks to himself how affection from her is the very best; how it's all he cares about, all he will ever want. 

 

He feels safe, he feels cared for, he feels protected -he feels at peace. 

 

Until eventually, and despite that she gives him more and more affection, he feels  _restless_. 

 

He squirms.

 

Alone, on the couch, or at dinner, across her.

 

His breathing becomes labored out of nowhere; a dizzying warmth spreads in his chest. Nothing has changed, yet _this_ changes everything.

 

One evening, she allows him to have a few spoons of cream, while she dries the dishes. "I should take you out to get ice cream, someday."

 

Even though he picks up on her dry tone, something that rarely happens, and even though he sees the small smile on her face, he can't smile with her.

 

The mere mention of getting out of the apartment makes his heart beat faster.

 

Doors exist for the sole purpose of trapping people. Keeping people out. 

 

Keeping people apart.

 

He doesn't notice that she gets closer.

 

With the pad of her thumb she quickly wipes some cream he had at the corner of his mouth. "Messy," she comments. 

 

A very unremarkable remark, one he most definitely wouldn't have remembered, if a faint blush hadn't colored her cheekbones. 

 

He looks straight at her then when her attention is back on the dishes. 

 

He looks at her when she eats. He looks at her when she brushes her teeth. He looks at her. That day, and the next day, and the next day.

 

More. Better. And when he can't look at her because she's not here, he thinks of her.

 

It's summer in the middle of winter.

 

He stares at the T.V., or he stares at the ceiling, and his mind isn't here. 

 

Her _tits._

 

Benjamin really likes those.

 

He's sure they must be soft. They fit nicely in his palms. 

 

He thinks again about the bras she forced him to give back, and he blushes from embarrassment as well as vexation.  _What are those good for?_  

 

She doesn't even enjoy wearing them. 

 

He'd keep her tits warm for her. He wouldn't mind. 

 

He'd like to find out more than anything how it feels to press his mouth into them; to press his entire face there. 

 

The T.V. is on, but he's lying on his front, like he does more and more now, and he's not really watching. 

 

Pressing his hips into the couch, he huffs, frustrated, until he's panting and red-faced and---

 

He imagines that it's nighttime, and that just enough light comes from the window to see what's around him. The apartment is silent -until he hears the bedroom door open. 

 

She knows he's not sleeping, and she pads to him in a very large shirt. 

 

Lying down next to him on the couch, on her back, her legs just twisted a bit toward him, her hands  _carefully_  work the shirt open -one button after the other, from her neck to her navel. His breathing gets heavier while he nicely waits for her to be done. 

 

Arching her back just so, she delicately pushes the fabric apart. Finally uncovering her tits to him with a breathy " _Here_ , Baby--"

 

Trembling, sighing, he squeezes them, gently; he bends to mouth at them; then  _sucks_  on them while she coos her praises.

 

The real Rey, though, keeps them hidden. 

 

When she passes the door, that evening, he rushes to her with only one preoccupation at the forefront of his mind.

 

_Is there a chance he'll sleep in the bed again tonight?_

 

He lets out a shaky exhale, expectant as he waits for her to take off her coat, but she drops her bag and approaches him right away to get her hug.

 

His mouth find her hair for a brief moment. When she clears her throat, he lets her part from him. 

 

She's avoiding his eyes. 

 

"Do you need a cold shower, Benjamin?"

 

He frowns.

 

"No."

 

She turns around and removes her coat to hang it. "...are you sure?"

 

He blinks. Then looks down at himself.

 

Oh. 

 _That_.

 

He sighs. "I was thinking of you."

  

She takes her shoes off, still avoiding his eyes.

 

"...oh? ...you weren't thinking about  _crème fraîche_?"

  

He shakes his head.

 

"No."

 

This time she looks straight at him. 

 

"Go take a shower, Benjamin." 

  

\---he obeys, because tonight isn't the night to be bratty, if he wants to sleep in her arms. 

 

But something unexpected happens. 

 

During their meal, Rey doesn't talk much, and later on, she explains to him that she's really tired today. "I don't think I'll watch T.V. tonight."

 

And  _that_  makes him still. 

 

"--oh," he breathes.

 

Not only does it mean that he most likely won't be allowed in her bed ----but he also won't get to rest his head in her lap, or have her play with his hair either. 

 

She  _looks_  tired. She most certainly does. He doesn't doubt that she is.

 

Yet he can't help but wonder if he's done something.

 

He can't think of anything, and he's too afraid to ask, because he's too afraid to find out. 

 

\--did he forget  _to do something_ , maybe?

 

He watches her eat, and forces his own food down his throat.

 

Sitting on the couch an hour later, in the dark, his eyes remain on the light under the bathroom door.

 

She took a second shower today, longer than usual, and has remained pretty quiet since dinner -which means that his stomach is in knots. 

 

He should be pretending to be asleep already, but he's too nervous to even lie down. 

 

When she gets out of the bathroom, he's unable to tell if she looks his way--

 

\---and if she does, it doesn't stop her on her way to the bedroom. 

 

She disappears in the hallway. 

 

He swallows with difficulty, his throat a bit too tight ---and slowly, he lies down on his side. 

 

"Benjamin."

 

He sits up. 

 

"Yes?"

 

She's barely spoken high enough for him to hear, even in the complete silence.

 

The pause that follows is as brief as can be, but it still feels too long for him. 

 

"...do you want to sleep in the bed again, tonight?"

 

What a question.

 

_"Yes."_

 

But he stays there.

 

Sometimes she asks him what he wants, it doesn't mean that she'll give it to him. 

 

He stares at nothing in the dark and just listens, his hands gripping the cushions on either side of his thighs. 

 

 

"...Come."

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Sometimes, it seems the going is just too rough / And things go wrong no matter what I do / Now and then, it seems that life is just too much / But you've got the love I need to see me through / When food is gone, you are my daily meal / When friends are gone, I know my savior's love is real / You know it's real"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LsrKXA2Awl0)
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> 
> AS FOR THE FANART AT THE BEGINNING OF THIS CHAPTER:  
> [It's so gorgeous I honestly don't have the words for it. Holy FUCK. THANK YOU KYLORENJEN.](https://kylorenjen.tumblr.com/post/183495290895/this-piece-was-inspired-by-my-favorite-wip-and-one)
> 
> Thank you so so much for reading =)


	14. Warm and weak

  
Rey doesn't  _explicitly_  decide that Benjamin should stop sleeping on the couch, but he certainly understands his two consecutive nights in the bed that way -and she doesn't do anything to stop that.

 

The third night comes, and before she even gets out of the bathroom, she notices that she can't hear the T.V. anymore. She already knows she'll find him in the bedroom -and she already knows she won't ask him to leave.

 

He's on his stomach, his eyes closed, pretending to be asleep.

 

There's no turning back.

 

And as the nights go by, he also seems to think she's lost the authority to revoke his right to sleep there. 

 

He's more prone to give her sass during the day and test her limits -hiding the remote control when he wants to make sure she won't change the channel, or misplacing some of her shampoos and conditioners so she'll smell a certain way- all seemingly without fearing in the slightest that she'll punish him by sending him back to the couch.

 

Because she knows, and he knows very well, apparently, without ever discussing it, that she won't refuse him access to the bed anymore.

 

 _Something_  is moving forward, and realizing how definitive the change seems to be makes her fidgety.

 

Nervous, like when she drove a car for the first time. Only this car doesn't seem to have any brakes, and  _where the fuck are they going?_

 

Meanwhile, them sleeping in the bed together gives her a front row seat to Benjamin's...  _vigor -_ in the morning, or during the night if she happens to wake up.

 

Whether she catches a glimpse of it straining the fabric of his boxer briefs while getting up, or  _feels it_ , hard against her leg or her hip as they're so often snuggling, the man pops more boners than a thirteen-year-old, and she is  _not_  ready to acknowledge why the air always grows so thick and hot the moment she's made aware of how  _healthy_  he is.

 

She'd much rather just rush to the damn shower.

 

This shift in their -- _relationship_ , would be much easier to underplay, if on top of that Benjamin hadn't decided to let his passion known with a more definite intent.

 

And him being blunt and unaware of boundaries, or him letting his thoughts known as they come, are hardly new traits of his.

 

What  _is_  new however, is that his  _observations_  tend to be framed more and more as compliments, she suspects like the ones he must hear on T.V., and that they now sometimes go with the faintest blush.

 

"Your tits are pretty today," he tells her one morning, shy as if he was asking her to prom.

 

Trying to win her heart.

 

She's brushing her teeth and dressed to go to work when that happens; he's standing with her by the sink, the light directly in his face. She's wearing a plain t-shirt.

 

"...what does that even mean?" she asks, tired, her mouth full of toothpaste.

 

He shrugs. "I like them."

 

 _I know you do_ , she wants to say, but she just sighs, then bends to spit. She supposes he had to make his feelings official.

 

She also supposes she should be concerned about how low the bar is, because now the mere mention of her breasts by him is enough to make her feel embarrassingly  _warm_  and  _weak_.

 

She avoids his eyes until she gets out of the bathroom. 

 

Later that week, she's watching T.V., his head is in her lap, and she looks down when he gently stops her hand in his hair and moves it in front of him, unfolding her fingers in the throbbing, dancing lights of the screen.

 

She doesn't think much of it, keeping half her attention on the show they're supposed to be watching, until she hears him mumble:

 

"I like how soft your hands are."

 

He caresses her knuckles with his thumb for emphasis.

 

She's struck for a moment too long -not that she finds endearing the way he tries to delicately manipulate her hand despite that the size of his  _paws_  don't make it easy for him to be delicate with anything- then she huffs and pulls her hand away because she's annoyed,  _not because there's any chance someone touching her hands turns her on, that's not a thing._

 

He's not discouraged, and she knows it's just a matter of time until his next attempt.

 

"I don't think we should wear clothes inside. They're not that useful."

 

He's tying the trash bag when he tells her that, in the middle of a conversation they're having about what they're going to watch that night. He says it like any other suggestion, something to consider. At this point, she just rolls her eyes.

 

"Okay, I appreciate your input."

 

But she should know better than to think he's done. "I already know what you look like, and you know what I look like."

 

What a good point.

 

Being reminded of his eyes on her, that she's seen, and in a way that hasn't happened in a long time, would be easy to ignore if her body, the traitor, wasn't reacting so instantly to it. 

 

She uses his argument to her advantage.

 

"Then why show ourselves at all? ...I'd be cold," she adds.

 

"I'd keep you warm," he counters.

 

This is torture.

 

Her wholesome home has turned into a fucking minefield.

 

When she gets in the bed one night, she does try to regain some control over the situation.

 

As soon as she's under the covers, he squirms his way to her to be flushed against her, pressing himself at her side, making her face burn, then sighing with satisfaction when he considers them settled. 

 

But after a handful of seconds she carefully shifts -hoping to move just enough that their bodies stop touching, turning her back to him in the process.

 

Except that almost as she does it, he moves too, unaware that the distance between them is intended; he nuzzles her hair, his chest warm along her back, his pelvis pressing the curve of her backside with a vengeance.

 

She barely parts from him a second time that she hears him huff a small and impatient  _no_  in her hair. He props himself up on his elbow and looks down at her in the dark. 

 

"I prefer when you're right against me," he explains to her,  _whispering_ , like they're two middle schoolers at a pajama party -and  _then_ , the fool has the  _gall_  to slide an arm around her waist, proceeding to downright  _pull her to him_ to demonstrate exactly how he wants her:

 

"...Like this," he breathes on her cheek. 

 

It's her turn to huff and squirm in his hold, her voice somewhat muffled: 

 

"-- _so you can get all cozy against my ass?_ "

 

"Yes!" He nods, like she finally gets it. "... _yes_ , I like it."

 

She arches her back to pull away. "Well  _I,_  don't like it!"

 

He immediately loosens his hold.

 

Lowering himself on his back, he lets out a quiet  _oh_ , like it didn't occur to him that it was a possibility.

 

She sits up, stammering: "It's, it's---distracting, and then I can't sleep! --And then I'm tired at work!"

 

A lie. Even while being --- _flustered_ , she's always slept better in his arms.

 

She swallows, preparing herself for what he could say next, but he just looks up at her and stays quiet. Mutely, he moves under the covers -compliantly retreating to his half of the bed until he's settled on his side, still turned to her.

 

She doesn't sleep for a good while, and given the complete silence of the room, she knows that he doesn't either. But eventually, they do fall asleep.

 

And when they wake up in the morning, they're in each other's arms. 

 

Even though it sometimes still feels like Benjamin was born yesterday, she can't ignore how more and more involved he is in their domestic life. 

 

The apartment is cleaner than it's ever been since she's started to live alone. He actually remembers the names she mentions in her gossips about work, and the stories that go with them, and she finds herself relying on him more each day regarding her home; she finds relief in it, no matter how small the tasks are.

 

As a result, she really is frustrated and restless in every possible way: she seems to be on a train that can't be stopped; Benjamin shows no embarrassment or uncertainty regarding his own feelings about anything, including her; but also, he's so well-behaved that she can't even reasonably justify her  _impatience_  toward him or the situation. 

 

More often than not, now, he even prefers to have her feet in his lap when watching T.V., to absently rub and squeeze them with his eyes on the screen, forcing her to pay more attention to the size of his hands in comparison to said feet than whatever they are supposed to be watching. 

 

When she twists out of his embrace to get up after the alarm goes off, one morning, he fists her t-shirt in her back and doesn't let her go. She's not quite awake yet, so she just blindly resists with a whine, but she gets a better appreciation of his strength when he gives another pull and easily throws her off balance, getting her to fall back into bed. 

 

She huffs and blinks her eyes open. His are still closed but it doesn't keep him from rolling her on top of him, locking her on his chest with his arms around her while she weakly writhes, still in a haze. 

 

"You're off today," he mumbles. 

 

"Nice try," she shoots back, groaning while trying to push against him. 

 

"It's Friday."

 

" _I work on Friday--_ "

 

"Not this week."

 

She stops pushing back, frowning, her hair tangled in her face.

 

\---then lets her head fall on his chest with another groan. 

 

 _He's right_. She told him about that change in her schedule two weeks before.

 

Seemingly trivial events like this one, along with how she melts above him and lets herself doze off right there, allow her to really see just how far they've both come. 

 

Another seemingly inconsequential event in particular lets her appreciate his progress in a very different way.

 

That same day, the rain is falling, its patter against the window lulling her, when she receives a text from Armie. 

 

It's the middle of the afternoon, and she's lying on the couch, her laptop on her chest. 

 

Her eyes widen when she grabs her phone.

 

Just seeing his name on the screen has her realize how much she's been living in a bubble, ever since she has a cat.

 

Not that she's received a single text from anyone she's supposed to invite, and it's been weeks, months even -but she admittedly let the silence stretch. 

It's unlike her. 

 

**still ok to have us over?**

**are you free next week-end?**

 

She also assumed they'd change their minds. And while she hasn't tried to reach them to confirm anything all this time, she still feels excitement at the idea of seeing them all again.  _It's been so long._

 

Not a minute later, she receives a text from Finnley. 

 

**my dragonfly, are you down for something at your place on Saturday? we can go somewhere else**

 

She's smiling, hard, but she only realizes she's smiling when she hears: 

 

"Is it work?"

 

She blinks, then looks over to the coffee table. Benjamin is legs crossed on the carpet, with what she believes is one of her Brontë novels in his hand. But right now he's looking at her. 

 

He's used to her never receiving any text, unless it's work. And she never smiles like that when it's work. 

 

"No, it's Armie." She puts her phone down. "Do you remember Armie?"

 

At the way he slightly lowers his head, his eyes still on her, it's evident that he does remember him. 

 

"Yes."

 

She pauses, but there is no way around it.

 

"He might come here, next week-end. With Rose, and a few other friends."

 

Silence.

 

He's still looking at her, seeming unsure himself of the questions he needs to ask, what else he needs to know. 

 

She hopes her expression remains neutral, that none of her own uncertainty at the idea of him meeting her longtime friends is showing. 

 

"They're very friendly people," she starts, trying to be reassuring, but only sounding patronizing to her own ears. But she keeps that approach regardless, trying to make the perspective as non-threatening as possible by over-simplifying it: "...They'll just come to eat and have a drink. It's nice."

 

"Can't they eat somewhere else?"

 

There's something he's not telling her. She closes her laptop, shifting to rest her shoulders against the cushion, so she can better see him.

 

"The point is for us to see each other."

 

He's not sitting quite as straight as he was a moment earlier. "I don't know them," he mutters.

 

"I know. You would meet them."

 

He goes quiet again, his eyes downcast, his thumb absently feeling the page. 

 

His unease is a reason good enough, she thinks, to not insist and post-pone the conversation; so she cuts it short and gets up.

 

"...I'm gonna make myself a tea."

 

That he doesn't follow her isn't alarming, but it's not a great sign either.

 

Once in the kitchen, her back to the living-room, she asks: "Do you want one?" --for the sole purpose of hearing him ask for some cream instead, knowing very well he never drinks any tea. 

 

Because she only hears the rain falling, she turns around.

 

He's not sitting by the coffee table anymore, and she doesn't see him. 

 

Frowning, she leaves the kitchen, her eyes on the bathroom door, left ajar. "Benjamin...?"

 

But she can see that the lights are off on the other side. 

 

She walks in the living-room, her attention first on the hallway thinking he might have gone to the bedroom, before she spots his boxer briefs on the carpet near the coffee table. 

 

And a few feet away from it, his tail is the first thing she sees of him.

 

He's squirming backward, trying to get rid of the sweatshirt he's trapped in, his entire body inside it except his tail. 

 

When it finally falls from him, he shakes his head, blinking, and swaying slightly. 

 

She lets herself down on the couch -and stares. Stunned.

 

This hasn't happened in a long time. 

 

Disoriented, he finally blinks up at her, his head low.

 

Then he takes a few steps and jumps on the couch. 

 

But instead of going straight to her, like she would expect, he goes on the other side of the couch and slowly curls on himself there. Settled, he  _sighs_ -tired as if he was just back from a long journey. 

 

She feels something crumple inside her, and she can't exactly say why.

 

"...Baby?" she tries with a small voice.

 

When he looks at her, she hesitantly pats the cushion next to her to get him to come.

 

"...come here, Kitty --come!" 

 

But he doesn't move. Pressing her lips tight, she leans to him and carefully slides her hands around his chest, uncurling him to hold him against her -and he lets her. 

 

Once in her arms, he pushes on his paws to hide his face in the crook of her elbow, between her arm and her waist, then stops moving. 

 

She keeps him there and soothingly runs her nails along his back.  

 

Confident she'll soon hear him purr, she waits for it to happen.

 

But it doesn't. 

 

While she pets him, he just stays there in her lap, his face hidden, immobile. 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Hope there's someone who'll set my heart free / Nice to hold when I'm tired / There's a ghost on the 'rizon / When I go to bed / How can I fall asleep at night / How will I rest my head?](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LyMGEq82uL4)
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> Thank you so so much for reading =')


	15. A wedding

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Several readers have let me know that Ao3 failed them during the last update^^. Be sure you read the last chapter before reading this one, there have been some developments. 
> 
>  
> 
> [Everybody check out this fanart by AISLING <3<3<3 It's the boob-grabbing scene! You dreamed of it, she made it, ENJOY](https://twitter.com/bazineapologist/status/1114616481721929728)
> 
>  
> 
> We also have the [CUTEST MOODBOARD](http://gabrielamurasaki.tumblr.com/post/183979377664/creamfanart), by Gabriela Murasaki <3
> 
> so needless to say we're spoiled, guys. Thank you so much to the both of you.

 

Benjamin turns back into a human after  _three. Long. Days._

 

Three days is more than enough time for Rey to understand that if she once wished he was just a cat, that's not the case anymore. 

 

The first afternoon he spends as a cat, she's not alarmed. She keeps her cool. 

 

It takes Benjamin a short hour of lying still in her arms, playing dead, to finally shyly stir and be cuddly again. He keeps his head down guiltily, ears flat, looking up at her to gauge if she's annoyed or mad. She's not, and to show him she offers him nothing but unconditional affection.

 

She doesn't really care about anything else.

 

He's a cat, but she wills herself not to worry too much, even though she can't let herself completely relax either. She imagines mothers feel this way when their kids run a fever: nothing to lose their minds over, but something to keep an eye on nonetheless. She remains confident. 

 

She must have expected a good night sleep would fix everything, because her disappointment is sharp when she finds he's still a cat the next morning, when she wakes up. Still, she's not _too_ worried. 

 

For as much as she can, she keeps him in the comfort of her arms, and gives him everything she knows he likes -the cheese, the tuna, the  _cream_ , of course.

 

And if dimly she anxiously thinks about what caused this, if she already knows she won't choose between him and her friends, she resolves not to mention it just yet. What would be the point, if he can't talk back?

 

Because those are behaviors she's familiar with, she's reassured when he follows her around, when he scowls at the doors she closes and stays away from the windows she leaves open. 

 

Two days in a row, though, she comes home from work to a cat -and what was initially just disappointment surely turns into something more desperate, less easy to tune out.

 

All the reassurance she has to give, she gives it through thorough and constant petting, holding him close, sleeping curled around him, kissing him all over his face; through weird names she can't help but coo at him, like  _my owl_ , or  _my water lily_.

 

She believes she can coax him back into the human he was for her, all the while hoping she won't yield and start thinking she's imagined it all.

 

Her heart speeds up out of nowhere, and she does her best to hide her concern to him, acting as if everything was normal, unable to stop herself when she silently wonders over and over again if she thought of everything, if she tried everything, trying to find a solution that doesn't exist. 

 

Meanwhile, even though he's quieter, Benjamin is more or less his usual self, still eager to show she's at the center of his world.

 

He snuggles against her, shivers, purrs.

 

Then on the third morning,  _finally_ , strong, adoring arms are holding her close again -and the sheer relief of feeling him warm and pressed to her muffles every other thought.

 

For the five first minutes, at least. After that, something shifts. 

  

He's almost as quiet as when he was a cat.

 

His touch, outside of the bed, is much more hesitant, turning stiff and awkward when they used to be casual, familiar -and while he takes his habits back easily, changing the sheets of the bed and doing the laundry, the dishes, it's hard for him to look her in the eyes when she's too close. More specifically, he looks down. 

 

No anger there. Rather, it looks like  _shame_ \--as if according to some strange laws he forces on himself, he had failed her. 

 

And although she's supposed to be the one who always knows what to do, now that she  _can_  bring up what happened, and now that she  _can_  talk about it with him,  _she won't._

 

She finds many reasons why she shouldn't rush this.  _They have six days to have that discussion; he seems too wary still; he's not ready._

 

He's trying to be extra-good for her, asking for her permission to sleep in the bed when they both know he doesn't need to, and falling asleep on his half of it, even though they always find their way to each other during the night. Testing the waters, just to be sure.

 

She really doesn't want to scare him. Yet, this is what she blurts out after coming home from work, just thirty-eight hours after he turned back into a human: 

 

"You'll have to wear pants on Saturday."

 

He stiffens in her arms, then slowly stands back. 

 

She's too tired to have the whole discussion, but was unable to keep it all in either. She thought about this all day at work, getting anxious over it, getting exhausted thinking about all the ways in which she'll have to prepare him for when he'll meet other humans than her. 

 

She wonders if he remembers what is supposed to happen on Saturday -but then one look at his face, and she's got her answer. 

 

He nods silently, avoiding her eyes. 

 

"They won't ask any question if we say we met at work. Nobody wants to know shit about retail."

 

Although after everything she's told him regarding her life at work, he'd be able to fool anyone about him working there.

 

He nods again.

 

She still waits for him to say something. Anything, really. 

 

"We're eating pasta tonight," he mutters.

 

She has no idea if it's his condition for him wearing pants on Saturday, or if he simply informs her that he's prepared pasta or  _what_. 

 

Her role now is to just acquiesce to whatever he says and wants. So her eyebrows go up on her forehead: "Sure! ---alright."

 

He makes an effort, she makes an effort. That sounds like a good deal to her. 

 

He remains quiet during the whole dinner. He's not sulking, just pensive -but it's too quiet for her. She's fidgety, and once they're done eating, while he's doing the dishes, she refuses to leave the room to go take her shower. She watches, her eyes almost never leaving him.

 

Afraid all it'll take for him to turn back into a cat is a  _blink_. 

 

No transformation happens, but she doesn't leave his side. They watch T.V. together, and despite that there isn't a chance in hell he'd ever refuse or pass on the occasion to have his hair played with, she  _demands_  he puts his head in her lap, not caring in the least that it sure sounds like  _she's_  the one who needs it.

 

He lies on the couch the way he always does, not seeming to notice any change in her, but her heart is racing. She's looking for symptoms on his body that aren't there. 

 

His eyes shut the moment her fingers are in his hair, and he sighs, his body curling, his chest soon gently rising and falling. 

 

She pays absolutely no attention at all to what's on the screen. Thankfully, it doesn't take her long to calm down. 

 

She goes off-script, however, when she bends, folding herself in half, to put a soft, tender peck on his temple, lingering there. His eyes slowly open. His ear turns red. 

 

_Has she never kissed him before?_

 

In the bathroom, she obsessively stares at him in the mirror while brushing her teeth, trying to catch any sign that he's about to transform -ignoring the fact that if it happened, she wouldn't be able to do anything to stop it. 

 

Being his big spoon, ten minutes later, in the bed, is another superstitious way for her to cope with that fear, thinking that if she holds him, he won't disappear. She suspects that he's all too secretly delighted about it.

 

When she comes home from work, the next day, the apartment is unusually silent, and Benjamin isn't at the door to welcome her like he always is. She's immediately on high alert. 

 

Her hands and arms heavy with grocery bags, she goes straight to the kitchen and calms down right away when she sees him sitting at the table.

 

However, her throat feels tight because he's perfectly still, his face serious like he's in the throes of an existential crisis. The whole thing looks like he's about to confront his wife with her infidelity. Like he just found out his entire existence is a lie. 

 

But his expression softens again when he sees her, and he sits up.

 

"Am I sexy?"

 

Shoulders dropping, her head tilting back, she lets out the longest sigh ever. 

 

 _Jesus_. She really thought something was wrong. 

 

She carries her bags to the counter, and leaves them there with a grunt. He comes to stand next to her, worry apparent on his face, anxious to hear her answer. 

 

"Why do you ask?"

 

 _Sexy_  is not a word she uses by any means. Him even less, obviously. 

 

She looks down at the groceries, unpacks everything she bought to put it away where it belongs, in the cupboards or the fridge. His eyes go from what her hands are doing to her face, back and forth.

  

" _Sexually attractive."_

 

"-- _yes_ , okay, I know what  _sexy_  means. Why do you ask."

 

"Kim said she finds Kanye sexy," he explains, "that she wouldn't date a man who isn't sexy." 

 

She'd almost think the Wests dropped by this afternoon to have a tea with him, then left right before she came home.

 

"...stop calling her  _Kim_  like you know her personally," she just distractedly comments, her head in the fridge.

 

"Kim K _,_ " he corrects behind her. 

 

"Yeah, I know who you're referring to." 

 

She closes the fridge, then goes back to the rest on the counter. The longer she avoids the question, the more he crowds her. 

 

"So am I?" he asks again.

 

She doesn't know how she can be blasé by his nonsense and still feel a distinctive flush creep up her neck. While she's avoiding his eyes,  pretending like she's taking care of something really important, he's intently staring down at her. Her voice is small and weak, and not only because she's tired:

 

"...are you what?"

 

"--sexy!" He huffs, annoyed, his patience put to test. 

 

He's not even aware of it, but he's essentially cornering her against the counter at this point, scanning her face. 

 

She surrenders with another sigh, her eyes closing. 

 

" _Yes_ , yes, you are..." she shakes her head, willing herself to say the word, even as her face burns anew, "...very, very sexy. You're the sexiest." 

 

She looks up at him just in time to see a wave of relief soften his face, and his shoulders relax. 

 

"You too," he tells her with finality. As if this was a discussion they really needed to have, and that it's now out of the way.

 

She returns to her bags, emptying the rest, when she hears him conclude, serene and satisfied: 

 

"So we're dating." 

 

Her eyes widen, and she turns around to face him, staring -but no sound comes out of her mouth. He clearly wasn't expecting this reaction, or maybe any reaction.

 

His face falls.

  

"You said I'm sexy!"

 

" _Right_ , but just--"

 

"-- _you said I'm the sexiest._ "

 

She doesn't know why she feels so panicked, so trapped, when agreeing with him wouldn't change anything of their situation. Still, defensively, she asks: "Do you even know what  _dating_  means?" 

 

"Yes, I do. It's when people watch movies together and eat together, we do these things all the time." 

 

She finds nothing to say, so she moves things around instead, her movements a touch too sudden and abrupt while she gathers everything she needs for dinner. 

 

He falls silent, and she swears to herself that she won't look at him, then fails not even half a minute later. He's just watching, quiet again. 

 

She fills a bowl of water to rinse the rice, and before she can think better of it, a few words timidly come out of her mouth:

 

"...we're  _living_  together, so that's even better." 

 

Something lightens up in him.

 

"It is?"

 

She moves the rice around in the bowl with her hand; paying close attention to it as the water grows opaque: "It ---absolutely is." 

 

He's silent again for a while, and without even looking at him, she feels it. He's afraid to ask a follow-up question, or rather to get the answer.

 

And she's not too brave either. For five good minutes, she keeps her head down, only taking care of her dinner. 

 

The water is gently boiling when she can't take it anymore and faces him again, her chin up. 

 

"What, Benjamin? ...what is it?"

 

He blinks. His ears turn pink, and his adam's apple bobs. 

 

"...am I your boyfriend, then?"

 

Her ears buzz. 

 

She's struck there for a few long seconds, then looks back down at her preparation. 

 

"...yes," she breathes, barely high enough over the sound of the water boiling, lacking air.

 

From the corner of her eye, on her left, she sees him bend slightly, as if to hear better.  

 

"Really?"

 

She clears her throat. 

 

Fuck it. 

 

"...yes,  _really_." 

 

He straightens back up -then stop moving entirely, right next to her, while she gives her hands a task, waiting for her heart to calm down. She doesn't see _what more_  he could possibly want now, so this better be the final test he had in store for her tonight. She huffs to herself.  

 

But because he's silent again, she sighs sharply and turns to him. However, his face stops her short of uttering a sound.

 

He's smiling the hardest she's ever seen him smile, visibly trying to have some control over it, but unable to, his eyes practically watering from sheer joy. He looks right at her, smiling, like this is the day of his wedding.

 

It's too contagious not to smile too, but she tries to hide hers by shaking her head and moving on with her preparation -feeling suddenly too self-conscious.

 

No amount of intimacy between them could have prepared her for the rest of the evening. He grins through the entire meal and talks more than he ever has -about what he's done in the house, and what cleaning products she'll need to buy; about what he's read, and what he's watched.

 

She's never seen anyone so happy to do the dishes in her life. 

 

But what's more unsettling than this sudden change of pace and tone, is how she feels about it.

 

She doesn't mind it. 

 

It doesn't annoy her, and it doesn't scare her. 

 

It's a normal evening for them -they eat sitting across each other, then watch T.V. next to each other, then prepare to go to bed together- except that his bliss shines brighter than the damn sun and that it leaves her light-headed.

 

She lets herself collapse on the bed, the bedside lamp still on. On her back, she sees he's calm and disciplined when he comes in after her -until he jumps on the bed, making her shriek. 

 

He hides his face in her neck, and he almost lets himself completely press her down with his weight, as if he intended to actually sleep this way -on her. 

 

She whines: "You're crushing me--"

 

His voice is really close to her ears, but his words are muffled. 

"I know. I don't care."

 

Her hands can't help but draw patterns over his back, and her eyes close as she speaks: 

"Are you really ready to sleep? ...you can watch more T.V."

 

She knows there's no chance he'll ever do that. They've always gone to bed together, and he's too attached to his habits -on top of being too attached to her. He still mumbles an actual reason in the crook of her neck.

 

"I've watched T.V. all day," he's still not moving, "I just want to be with you." 

 

She breathes in the smell of lilac coming from his hair, so strong there's no doubt that he washed them this afternoon. She also discerns the perfume she wears during the day, and that she sprayed over his sweatshirt, as he requested. 

 

Before he falls asleep this way and actually smother her, she taps gently on his shoulder. "I need sleep." 

 

"You don't work tomorrow."

 

She rolls her eyes despite how heavy her eyelids are. _He pays attention, doesn't he._

 

"I'm still tired."

 

There's the slightest hesitation before he moves, but he does, rolling off of her, the mattress dipping under him. 

 

He slides under the covers,  _on his side of the bed_ , and lies on his back -his head turned to her, waiting for her to switch the light off. 

 

The room goes completely dark. She closes her eyes.

 

She should practically fall asleep instantly, to the sound of him breathing, feeling his weight on the other half of the mattress. 

 

But it's as if turning the lights off had tricked her mind. Her eyes are now wide open. 

 

She holds her breath for a good while and listens closely, her blood growing louder in her ears.

 

He's not moving, minding his own business, his eyes probably closed. It only makes her want to move her feet more, but even that is too much noise in the silence of the room. 

 

Fighting the urge, her whole body tenses with the need to move or huff.

 

What is wrong with her? 

 

Checking the time now would be very discouraging. She must not have turned the light off more than five minutes ago.

 

She turns her head to Benjamin, but the room is too dark tonight. She can't see anything. 

 

He's not moving at all, and she now doesn't seem to be able to hear him breathe anymore, over her restlessness. 

 

She manages to be immobile for five long seconds. 

 

Then the pressure breaks her. She sits up. 

 

She'll never know if he would have reacted to that, before she doesn't leave him the time, and immediately kneels and moves to him, her hands flat, reaching in the space before her to find his face. 

 

She finds his shoulders first, eliciting a quiet  _hum_  from him. She assumes the contact confuses him, but naturally, that doesn't slow her down.

 

Her hand awkwardly follows the curve of his shoulder to his neck ---then to his mouth. His breath is warm on her fingers. 

 

"You h--" is all he has the time to murmur before she rudely  _shushes_  him, covering his mouth. 

 

Although he's virtually immobile, she holds his face in place, rougher than she means to be in her haste. 

 

Then she leans forward, keeping her fingers on his lips to be sure to find them.

 

She sighs on his cheek when her mouth moves over his. She's not being delicate at all, pressing a series of kisses some would argue a bit too vigorously, the wet smacking sounds clear in the room; as if she was kissing him simply because it needs to be done, and that she's just there to do her job.

 

He just lies there and takes everything, like a good boy, essentially trying to melt his way through the mattress.

 

" _Roll over_ ," she instructs him when she decides that she's full, while pushing behind his right shoulder to have him lie on his side, facing away from her.

 

He obeys, and she lies back down, huffing, squirming so that her front is pressed to his back, her arm keeping him tight, her leg possessively folding over his hip.

 

_There._

 

Now she can finally sleep. 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Lost is how I'm feeling, lying in your arms / When the world outside's too much to take / That all ends when I'm with you](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eiFre0FK-s0)


	16. A wedding dress

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [BABIES, LilithSaur made us a fanart, HOW ABOUT THAT. It's as precious as ever, check it out and give her the love she deserves](https://twitter.com/lilithsaur/status/1117523282977263616)
> 
> There's also [another p e r f e c t MOODBOARD](https://ton.twitter.com/i/ton/data/dm/1117833207213363205/1117833202394181634/X1P342ly.jpg) by none other than [violethoure666](https://archiveofourown.org/users/violethoure666/pseuds/violethoure666/works) (if you don't know, she's one of the best authors this fandom has to offer) that you might want to check out too =)

 

The dress Rey picks, the next morning, is entirely made of cotton. It's a summer dress, but the fabric is a touch too thick to be ideal for a very hot day. 

 

It reaches just above the knee. The straps are two inches wide. The neckline barely hints at her cleavage.

 

Its color could remind some of a very pale, pinkish eggshell, or of a very thick kind of cream. To most, it just appears to be white. 

 

She picks it unbeknownst to Benjamin, while he's still in the shower. 

 

She has many reasons to pick that dress. It's a single piece of clothing, hence it's easy to put on. It's comfortable enough to stay in; she has to wash the rest of her warmer, more season-appropriate outfits, and the clothes Benjamin washed yesterday are still drying in the storeroom. 

 

And it's not too cold, today, that she can't wear it inside. She virtually never gets out of her apartment on her days off anyway -certainly not ever since Benjamin has come into her life. 

 

However, facing the mirror, she has to wonder if she's not trying to hide to herself some ulterior motives.

 

Some would argue that that dress is a size too small for her. The fabric is tight around her torso, more so than intended by whoever designed it. 

 

As a result, it makes the vertical series of small, ivory buttons, joining her neckline to her navel, strain slightly. Those buttons could have been decorative, but they're not. They allow her to open the front of the dress -not that she's ever opened it, since it doesn't serve any real purpose to anyone who isn't a nursing mother. 

 

She certainly knows, before he sees it, what Benjamin will think of that dress -particularly considering that she's not wearing a bra. 

 

And she doesn't have to wonder for long; his emotion at the sight of the dress, at how well it hugs her, is as subtle as ever: not subtle at all.

 

He's unable to fool anyone about what he feels or thinks, especially when it comes to her breasts. Not that he's ever tried to be ambiguous about his feelings.

 

Hair wet and curling after his shower, he pushes the door wider and appears in a cloud of steam.

 

Then stares. 

 

He stares while setting the table for breakfast, then while eating, then while doing the dishes; he stares at her chest, and she pretends like she's not aware of it. 

 

He silently sucks on his bottom lip, then his upper lip, something some people do because they're nervous. He's not nervous. 

 

She has to give him credit because although he definitely notices, he doesn't mention the dress to her.

 

They discuss what they should eat at noon while still eating breakfast; Benjamin has almost read all of her old books, and he asks her for new ones. She tells him about those that left an impression on her, among the very few she read after high school. It's quite clear anyway that anything she'll recommend, he'll read. 

 

Not the warmest day, but it is sunny out. Standing in front of the sink, and looking at the light coming through the window into the living-room, she wonders for a minute where she would take Benjamin if he let her take him out. 

 

Because time flies on Pinterest, noon is here in a blink, and Rey finds the motivation to prepare a pumpkin tart, a recipe she hasn't cooked in maybe ten years. The day before, she went out of her way to find a pumpkin after Benjamin told her he had never eaten any. 

 

He's always appreciated the effort she puts into the presentation of her dishes, which makes it easier for her to care, like she used to when cooking was still a real source of joy for her.

 

The oven is preheating and blows hot air on her thighs; the T.V. chatters low in the background; her  _kitty_  is with her in the kitchen. 

 

It's in that sunny, quiet, peaceful moment that he asks her: 

 

"What do you think of Mike Pence?"

 

"... _Mike Pence?"_

 

She repeats it because that name, in her kitchen, when she's cooking, doesn't make any sense -but naturally he understands it like she doesn't know who he's talking about. 

 

"The Vice President."

 

"Right." Her focus remains on the pie. "I don't want to think about him, is what I think."

 

"Who do you vote for?"

 

What.

 

She doesn't bother asking him what exactly he's referring to, what candidate or what election; she just cuts it short. 

 

"I don't vote."

 

Then, she reflexively braces herself for the kind of admonishment she's used to hear when she's being honest about this, forgetting that she's not dealing with that type of person for half a second.

 

No outrage from him at this revelation -however, habits die hard, and she still feels the need to defend herself; to soften the edges. 

 

"Rich people put whoever they want in power anyway."

 

But then, because he nods at that without expressing the slightest reservation, she briefly closes her eyes with a sigh. She feels silly.

 

"I'm not an expert, Baby. My opinion doesn't really matter."

 

"Yours is the only opinion that matters to me." 

 

She presses her lips tight, her fingers working quickly around the tart to fold back the pastry dough. " _Well that's not good_ ," she mutters, so low that he must think she's talking about the pie.

 

"You should get other perspectives on the world than--", she pauses, her voice lowering to a murmur "---mine or what the fucking TV shows you."

 

"I should go on the internet," he suggests.

 

"Sure."

 

With a knife she opens the small bag of  _buffala_ , drains it in the sink, then tears the cheese in small pieces to place them all over the pie. She dries her hands with a towel then grabs his sweatshirt at the waist to have him face her, trying to communicate enthusiasm through a forced smile: 

 

"There are also people coming on Saturday, who have plenty of opinions."

 

She sees him tense, his shoulders going almost imperceptibly up. He's looking right at her, but doesn't say anything. 

 

"This is exciting, isn't it?" she tries again, smiling hard with her eyebrows up, hoping she's not wincing.

 

"Yes," he says, his strained expression indicating the perfect opposite. 

 

_Convincing._

 

Before she can think of another awkward encouragement to give him, she watches as his eyes slowly travel south from her eyes to the neckline of her dress. 

 

Shameless, like she's not even there so see it happen. Her hands instinctively fist the sweatshirt at his waist under his gaze. 

 

She hates to disrupt the  _moment_  he's having with her chest, but--

 

"You like the  _dress_ , Benjamin?"

 

His eyes find hers again, and he nods once: "...yes."

 

"Pretty, isn't it?" 

 

He looks back down, seemingly noticing the dress actually continues past the neckline, that it even has a skirt and  _everything_.

 

"Yes," he confirms again. 

 

She finally lets go of him and goes back to her pie. 

 

"What is it that does it for you, what is it you particularly like about it?" she asks while cutting open a bag of pumpkin seeds, trying to sound as innocent as she can, curious to see if he'll deflect: "The cut, the color, the fabric?"

 

"I like how your tits look in it." 

 

Not a surprising answer by any means, yet she still sucks in a breath at the bluntness, her eyes remaining on the seeds she scatters over the pie.

 

"...what a twist," she comments to herself.

 

Now that it's out of the bag, he's even less shy than a minute before and stares at her chest with a vengeance -and after a minute of feeling his eyes go over every detail of her skin, making her hyper aware of the movements of her chest when she breathes, she asks:

 

"Scared they'll run away?"

 

"No," he replies very seriously, confident about that one certainty in Life that her  _tits_  aren't going anywhere. But he seizes the opportunity to ask her what she can safely assume has been on his mind for a good while:

 

"Do you think you'll change your mind?"

 

The hair stand on her nape.

 

"About what?"

 

"About letting me pet them."

 

" _I'm cooking_ ," she mutters back, trying to ignore the warmth sneaking up her spine all the way to the back of her skull. Her face feels hot. She's standing so close to the oven. With a sharp pull, she tears the surplus of backing paper all around the tart pan.

 

He casually pleads his case, leaning his hip against the counter, searching her face for any positive sign: "It wouldn't be much different than when I touch your feet--"

 

"It would, because when you touch my feet I'm able to focus on something else," she  _lies_.

 

But it's like she hasn't said anything, and he finishes his sentence:

 

"--except that I would like to have them in my mouth, too."

 

Since she's a poor mortal, her brain can't help it: every words coming out of him provide her with vivid mental images, or with the fresh as ever memory of him feeling her up. But to have the absolute  _audacity_  of telling her that with  _that_  mouth--

  

"Oh," she huffs, her breath short, opening the oven to finally put the tart inside, " _you wouldn't like to have my feet in your mouth?_ "

 

Toying with his inability to detect sarcasms is one of her favorite pass-time, and a small revenge to have on him for all the times he catches her off guard with his uncompromising  _candor_ and makes her blush and huff and clear her throat.

 

But as always, he's the one unknowingly winning the round this time too, when he actually considers her question, then gives her a small shrug to indicate that, come to think of it, he wouldn't mind having her feet in his mouth either. 

 

Never in her life before have feelings been that much spoken aloud and left in plain sight in the middle of the room. She can't go around them. 

 

Rey has never liked to give things a name, at least an official one.

 

Acknowledging what's happening around her or inside her, doesn't come easily to her -and she's stunned time and time again when Benjamin does it, despite that she most definitely knows by now that that's only what's to be expected from him. 

 

Sometimes she lacks air, she feels like the room is too small. Her grandpa used to handle hers and his feelings very differently. He'd ignore them until they'd go away, like a sane human being.

 

The tart is baking, the oven blows hot air in the kitchen with a contented hum, and Rey lies down on the couch like after a day of hard work, her head resting on the blue pillow Benjamin used to sleep on, against the armrest of the couch, turned to the T.V., her feet on Benjamin's lap.

 

They don't bother to change the channel, and leave the game show on just as a way to pass the time until the tart is ready to eat.

 

Benjamin's eyes are on the T.V., but he seems to be zoning out, his hands absently feeling her ankle, her calf -then her ankle again, then the ball of her foot.

 

The quiet of the apartment, the sun, the gentle hum of the oven, and his hands on her legs would normally relax her. But what's been said is now impossible to ignore, and everything that can usually lull her to sleep is now keeping her wide awake.  

 

His hands never go higher than her calf. She wonders if he ever thought of them creeping higher being a possibility.

 

Over her knee. Her thigh.

 

Nothing about  _that_  has ever been said aloud.

 

She keeps _saying nothing_ , but she glances his way a few times and after a while her eyes remain on his hands, tracking his movements while he's not looking. 

 

She's getting good, firm and warm repeated feels of his hands, like she has many evenings before, enough times and then some to be able to perfectly imagine what they would feel like somewhere else. 

 

Benjamin's eyes are on the screen, but she knows he's lost in his thoughts. The audience flatly cheers from time to time.

 

She weakly stretches her legs, her toes spreading, and is about to finally watch the T.V. when she catches him looking down at his hands on her ankles. 

 

He just seem to be daydreaming, but she observes him as his attention goes higher on her thighs, her hips, her waist--

 

She expects him to meet her eyes eventually, but his stop at her chest again to linger there.

 

He sighs through his nose, like a wistful princess at the window of her tower waiting for a curse to be lifted. 

 

The curse here being the dress. 

 

Her chest rises and falls a bit more unevenly, and her focus narrows despite herself to the feeling of her breasts pushing against the cotton of her dress and the warmth of his palms on her ankles. She swallows.

 

"...admiring the dress?"

 

He looks back at her, finally aware she's watching him.

 

Then nods shyly.

 

She turns her head back to the T.V., arching her back just so as she does, trying to stretch her neck and shoulders.

 

She's become really tense in a really short time.

 

It's a very unsettling experience to not be moving at all, to be  _lying down_ , in such peaceful surroundings, and still feel her heart beat with so much determination when nothing is happening. 

 

Needless to say it gets much, much worse when something  _does_  happen. 

 

Slowly, to be sure she doesn't attract his attention right away, her hands move upward, from her belly to the first button at the neckline of her dress.

 

She curls her toes, her blood hot; her fingers almost too weak to push open the buttons as she undoes them one by one along her torso, without moving too abruptly.

 

She doesn't check to see if he's noticed what's happening, and her pulse quickens just from that anticipation. She pushes open the last button, just above her navel, but doesn't open the dress and leaves it that way without saying anything, her eyes still on the T.V. like nothing happened -her breasts still hidden.

 

She's having a lot of fun. 

 

She assumes that he'll say something when he finds out, but she's wrong, he doesn't. His thumb, brushing the inside of her ankle back and forth, comes to a halt. Then his other hand progressively tightens its grip around her second ankle. 

 

Her toes nervously curl again and she clenches her fists, pretending to frown at the T.V., like she has  _any_  idea what is even going on there. 

 

His hand doesn't loosen around her ankle, or barely, and he hasn't resumed his strokes. Waiting for something maybe. 

 

He's not gonna ask about her breasts  _again_ , she thinks she can be sure of that. He's learned not to be a brat. 

 

So she gathers the courage needed, and finally looks back at him. 

 

With the light coming from the window behind him, she has to wait for her eyes to adjust, before she can tell what he's looking at. She could have expected him to be staring at the opening of her dress; his eyes are on hers instead.

 

His pupils are so  _blown_ , if it weren't for the soft blush of his face he'd look like a demon. Her blood beats louder in her ears.

 

She keeps her voice deliberately small:

 

"--what?" 

 

He stares back at her; then his adam's apple bobs. 

 

"Nothing."

 

Jesus, his voice is gone.

 

"Kitty," -she scans his face for a moment, trying her best not to smirk, blinking innocently: "Are you  _unwell_? ---Do you want to lie down too?" 

 

" _Yes_ ," he breathes.

 

She scoots over. "Here." 

 

There's barely any room. But the point of this isn't for their bodies to  _not_  touch.

 

He bends, cautiously, his eyes not leaving her, as if she could change her mind or disappear into thin air the next second; then crawls in the same wary way, to lie down on his side between her and the back of the couch, flushed against her; his thigh, heavy, slowly coming to rest over hers, his nose level with her temple. 

 

His hand, meanwhile, settles over her ribs - _just_  below her right breast.

 

Clearly itching to touch what is  _so completely_  within reach and that she  _still_  hasn't allowed him to touch yet. All it would take for him would be to slide his fingers in the tight,  _tight_  space between her dress and her and  _squeeze_ \---

 

He sighs again, a bit too sharply, and she sucks in her lips to keep from smiling, her head turned back to the T.V.

 

She arches her back, her pelvis turned slightly to him, trying to keep her breathing slow and even.  

 

He doesn't move, and he doesn't say anything -but there's no wondering what's already growing harder against her thigh. 

 

 She looks down at his hand resting flat on her ribs. 

 

"Baby?"

 

"Mmh!"

 

"I'm not feeling too good either." 

 

Several candidates buzz at the same time.

 

"What-" Benjamin croaks weakly.

 

"I'm stressed out."

 

She says that while languidly twisting her waist, trying to seduce the cat in him. 

 

She slightly cocks her head with the hint of a pout ---savoring in advance the landing of her punchline.

 

"...A good  _tit massage_  would surely do it," his ear becomes darker shade of pink, and by some miracle, she manages not to snort at her own words: "...but my hands are too small to properly take care of it."

 

The audience cheers in the background. 

 

It seems to her that this time, in the light of their earlier conversation, he's perfectly aware that she's toying with him -but his emotion about what is happening is still too strong for him to be other than dead serious when he replies: 

 

"I'll do it."

 

_"You're sure?"_

 

 _Uh_ , he grunts to confirm -because now he's forgotten all his words at once. He fists her dress at her waist, pressing himself closer to her.

 

His eyes grow darker still as they zero in on the skin the dress isn't covering.

 

He was far from being  _that_  shaken over the possibility of getting his hands on  _them_ , a few months ago -but she's made him wait, hasn't she? He's had time to obsess over them, so much that now that the day has come, he's coming undone.

 

"Thank you," she whispers, arching her back a touch more, so he'll unwrap his present himself -and while his mission is probably too holy in his eyes to be rushed, he doesn't miss a beat either.

 

His palm, warm, slides in the opening of the dress, over her ribs. He predictably barely has enough room to move, but he does, upward--

\--then lightly presses the soft flesh there.

 

_Finally._

 

She inhales sharply through her nose with a hum, arching some more, her lips closed tight, her eyes almost closing -and her right leg slowly folds over his thigh.

 

He breathes heavily through his nose already as he braces himself on his elbow to have a better look at her chest, pulling down the offensive straps of her dress, past her shoulders.

 

He sighs, without any restraint this time;  _they're there_ , finally at his mercy and in plain sight, and she's suddenly too self-conscious under his stare to even dare breathe and make them move.

 

Then he sighs a second time, on her skin, when his shy, supple lips press a peck on her nipple to gently wake it up.

  

It stands at attention immediately, missing the affection of his mouth as soon as he parts.

 

Because he's fair and wouldn't want one to be jealous of the other, she presumes, his lips close around the second one to give it a coy, wet  _suck_ , his hand making sure to squeeze the other to keep it warm. 

 

He nuzzles the underside and ends his caress with noisy kisses, pressing his mouth and his nose in them.

 

Her cheeks are burning.

 

She pushes his hair away from his face, tucking them behind his ear to better see his eyes close in sheer bliss. 

 

After those first tastes his shyness is gone, and he settles better over her, lying down on her to get comfortable and give her nipples lazy laps and sucks, filling the room with wet sounds over the commercials. 

 

She lies there and lets him feast on her tits, feeling helpless in the most delicious way, trapped under his weight, her core throbbing with need when she imagines that very obliging mouth somewhere else. 

 

He  _squeezes, nuzzles, kisses, suckles_ , never leaving one breast unattended, moving his hips  _just so_  against her.

 

She sighs, wetting her lips, brushing her thumb at the corner of his swollen mouth, humming to him that he's  _so gentle, so soft, so good._

 

In no time her tits are drenched, flushed and full of his attention, but his eyelids are still heavy like a drunk's, and she's not getting tired of it, not even a little bit, her chest swelling, pushing her tits into his warm, waiting mouth. 

  

She tries to be sly, then, but she only sounds breathless: 

 

"Is it everything you imagined it'd be?"

 

She's not even sure he hears her.  _Uh_ , he grunts in her flesh -the sound muffled by a mouthful he doesn't want to let go of.

 

"Kitty?"

 

He releases it with a light  _pop_  and a  _hum_ , slow-blinking at her, his hair falling across his eyes, sucking in his own bruised lips as if to taste her there, then gives her a blissed out: "Yes, thank you, I love them" -the way a boy would thank his Mom for a toy he'll get to play with whenever he wants.

 

She lets her head roll back with yet another sigh. 

 

"My pleasure."

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [And I need your love / That's all I'm living for / I didn't want to pressure you / But all I ever wanted to do / I want to be your lover](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KqqwdUSrrA)


	17. Vanilla

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [ New moodboard by Gabriela Murasaki! =D](http://gabrielamurasaki.tumblr.com/post/184360617754/once-again-ao3animal-delivered-an-amazing)
> 
>  
> 
> Brief recap: Rey and Benjamin are on the couch, the tart is cooking, and at the end of the week, Rey's friends have been invited (that last thing won't be mentioned, but just to remind you of it)
> 
> I hope you enjoy, thank you for reading =)

 

Rey's eyes open. 

 

_The oven._

 

Her hands fist Benjamin's hair roughly, pulling his head backward to have him release the tit he was sucking on with a wet pop. Lips plump and red, he's too blissed out to react when she pushes him off her and jumps off the couch, her dress still open wide on her soaked, flushed chest as she runs to the kitchen. 

 

She glances at the clock above the fridge, then opens the oven to get confirmation that,  _no_ , they haven't been at it for that long.

 

She apparently just can't really trust her perception of time when he's lazily twirling his tongue around the pink, tender flesh of her nipple, humming his quiet satisfaction into it.

 

She sighs sharply. The tart is fine, not ready yet. The oven blows hot air on her chest and face before she closes it; then, she shivers when the cold hits her wet skin, her nipples tightening, indignant that she removed them from the comfort of her pet's mouth. She'd like nothing more than to run and slides back under him like under a thick, heavy cover to plop her tits back into his mouth and keep them warm there. 

 

But heavy footsteps get closer behind her, and before he can say anything she hurries to fasten at least one button to hide her tits again from him; then she turns around to face him. 

 

His...  _arousal_  is tucked against his hip, apparent under the fabric of his boxer briefs and the hem of his sweatshirt. He licks and sucks his lips for a few seconds, perhaps missing the heat of her tits between them; then he eyes her fastened dress with a defeated sigh, still visibly high on the experience he's just had, his pupils blown, his eyelids heavy. 

  

Her cunt is still throbbing for attention, yet she tries to keep her composure when he asks, his fists clenching, his voice weak and hoarse: 

 

"Can we go back on the couch?"

 

Because she knows she will give in right away if she keeps her eyes on him, she turns around. The counter in front of her is a mess -the bowls, the wooden spoon, the rest of the pumpkin seeds are still there among other things -and she wants to take care of that first, just  _because_. So she starts cleaning as efficiently as she can. She feels him get closer behind her, and she almost  _shivers_ in the face of his innocence, knowing what might just be about to happen; but she tries not to show anything and shakes her head  _no_. "I can't, I have to cook, baby."

 

"You already cooked."

 

"I know."

 

She wipes clean half of the counter, her tits moving with the abrupt movements of her hand, the only button she fastened straining to keep the dress together -and he stands close, making sure he doesn't miss anything, following her around as she moves from the sink to the bin, then back to the counter, pleading his case in favor of the situation he has between his legs. 

 

"You cooked enough," he tries again. "You don't have to cook more."

 

"I don't  _have_  to, I want to."

 

She tries to focus on her task, but still glances at him. Is this sweatshirt the right size? Does she never appreciate how built he is, that she just notices now how slightly tight it is around his shoulders?

 

"It's a special recipe I'd like to try," she adds for good measure, her voice somewhat strained.

 

Mouth twisting, he's  _thinking_ , trying to come up with something to sway her, she presumes, and probably also trying to assess why he lost her attention in the first place. She hurries to throw away and clean everything in the meantime, still doing her best to ignore him.

 

He's silent for a brief moment, shifting his weight, until she hears him say shyly:

 

"You're--- you're sexy."

 

A spark licks up her spine, even as she knows she'd consider this is a very cheap attempt at wooing her, coming from anyone else. 

 

"You're saying that, but I'm sure any tits would do," she tells him dryly. She throws the last utensils in the sink, then looks up at him. 

 

He's  _offended_. "No. They  _have_ to be yours."

 

He's such a romantic, isn't he?

 

She quickly wrings a wet cloth over the sink to wipe the rest of the counter clean, but he interrupts her to use his habitual card, albeit without much confidence -maybe because he thinks it's his last resort. 

 

"Can I --have a hug?"

 

She turns her head and takes a good look at him. How is he still hard? Isn't that painful? She's suddenly overwhelmed by a strong need to protect him. To  _take care_  of that erection for him. 

 

It's a strange feeling, not entirely made of arousal, and she has no intention of examining that further. A  _hug_  delays her plan, but she's too curious to see what he'll do to give it a pass. Someone stupid claps and dances inside her, anticipating the contact of his cock with her belly.

 

So she wordlessly opens her arms to him the way she always does, expecting him to wrap his arms around her shoulders and let her circle his waist with hers. 

 

But when he steps closer, his breath quiet but shaky, he gently wraps a hand around her elbow instead, and very slowly turns her around, seemingly not entirely sure of what he's doing but doing it anyway. Her brief frown, and a confused " _Huh?_ " is all the reaction she has; she lets him arrange her.

 

His breath, hot on her neck, stutters with hers when he's the one circling her waist, squeezing a small, helpless  _oh_  out of her when he presses her flushed against him then walks her to the counter until her hips meet it.

 

Her whole body taut with attention, standing on her toes between his feet, she clamps her mouth shut but a soft growl rolls in her chest when he bends his knees, to better press his pelvis against her ass with a shallow sigh. Her hands flat on the counter, his arms holding her tight to his torso and his pelvis, they move together to repeat the motion.

 

Her head is spinning; she only realizes how out of breath she is when she speaks.

 

"Seems like you're quite fond of my ass too."

 

" _Yes_ ," he hisses in her shoulder.

 

"I'm relieved." 

 

He rolls his hips artlessly, but it's more than enough to make her pant with him. Her legs get weaker every instant. 

 

For some reason, she doesn't expect to feel his hand slide in the opening of her dress, over her ribs. The one button she closed struggles to keep the fabric together when the same hand runs flat on her skin until it finds her left tit; her knee  _jerks_ and bumps the cupboard below, but he's not startled, and he tenderly fondles her with another sigh on her neck.

 

Both forgotten, the T.V. chats obnoxiously but at a low volume on the other side of the room, and right next to them, the oven keeps humming.

 

She's only able to slur, but she still makes a point in telling him:

 

"This... this... _hug_  sure is ---more thorough than usual--" she blows a lock of hair out of her face, "You don't usually feel up my tits while hugging me."

 

"I'll--I'm--just drying them," he stammers, brushing his thumb over her nipple -to demonstrate his drying technique, she imagines. Then he drops all pretense, probably thinking his luck can run out at any time. "...Can I pet your ass, too?" he asks -as if he wasn't humping her already.

 

She  _cannot_  say no. She'd like to, to teach him a lesson, but she physically can't. 

 

"...of course," she breathes, "--'wouldn't be a hug otherwise." 

 

Like a child unable to savor his cake, he leans back and takes generous handfuls, squeezing tight, palming her -then immediately realizes he prefers to press his cock into it. Bracing herself on the counter, she swallows a moan, her arms slightly shaking.

 

"Okay --enough, this... recipe can't wait," she chokes, gently pushing back. 

 

He clenches his jaw to swallow any protest, the good boy, and leans back to let her ass walk away from him to the fridge.

 

When she puts the jar of _crème fraîche_  on the counter, he barely reacts to it. Looks like his brief experience with her ass has effortlessly dethroned his love for dairy products; he just dreamily looks at her behind like it's on the other side of a shop window. 

 

"You don't seem to like my dress a whole lot after all."

 

Even as he gives it a stare that could kill, he exhales through his nose and mumbles in the most unconvincing way: "I  _do_... like it."

 

She tries to ignore the weight of his eyes, and without looking at him or lifting up her skirt completely, she reaches under it to hook a finger under the hem of her panties and slowly pulls them down,  _right there_  in front of him, making it roll down her legs without a word until they drop on the floor. 

 

He blinks, but, incredibly even for him, he otherwise doesn't react more than that, too used to never question her.  

 

She doesn't know if he'd notice the difference, but she actually always buys him the most expensive, thickest, fattest cream there is. A cream so fat, she could take a spoonful of it, turn it upside down, and expect it to stick to the spoon. Its color is a beautiful off-white that could have her believe there's vanilla in it. 

 

After unscrewing the lid, facing the counter, she slowly plunges four fingers in it, pulling a heavy handful out of the jar. She supposes that this time it's out of the ordinary enough for him that she's not using a spoon, when she so often insists he uses one when he wants to eat some. 

 

Blood floods her face despite her bravado when her hand disappears under the skirt, in the front. She resists looking at him, her ears hot, and just focus on keeping her hand steady as it generously spreads the cream over her folds, her swollen clit, pushing some inside her heat, gently stuffing herself with cream like it's the most common thing. She shivers briefly at the contact at first, the cold clashing with her burning skin; no matter how thick it is, the cream melts almost instantly, some dripping on the floor, and some rolling down her thighs. What a waste.

 

Oh well.

 

In a way that is supposed to be casual, she wordlessly takes some more, too much for the area she's trying to cover, and reaches behind to spread some in the warmth of her ass, parting it, swallowing thickly as she tries to keep looking at the wall in front of her.

 

Benjamin hasn't said a word. It seems that he's stopped breathing.

 

"...you okay, Baby?" 

 

 _Uh_ , he groans. 

 

She glances on her right, and according to his hard-on, he's fine. No one is being traumatized.

 

She exhales, wiping her hand clean with the cloth. "All done," she informs him, voice hoarse. 

 

"I want some," he replies immediately, presumably talking about the cream -not the cream left in the jar.

 

"You can have some."

 

He reaches for her skirt. 

 

"No, no," she falsely chastises, her voice soft, gently pushing away his hand. Just like that, she leaves the kitchen.

 

He must be stunned, because she doesn't hear him follow her, the sweet boy. She pats her thigh on her way to the couch: "Here, Kitty, come."

 

No need to tell him twice.

 

He joins her in a few strides, then stands behind her, watching as she crawls on the couch on shaky arms before lowering herself to lie on her front, bracing herself on her elbows. Then, she cranes and twists her neck to look back at him above her shoulder, arching her back as much as she can.

 

Presenting her ass to him, although her dress is still hiding it, the hem riding right at the top of her thighs in this position.  

 

"Go ahead, sweetheart," she breathes, "...you can push my skirt out of the way, now, if it bothers you."

 

Her heart beats harder very suddenly, and she can't imagine the state  _he_  must be in, if she read him correctly at all. 

 

She turns her head, looking at the cushion in front of her; her naked toes flex in anticipation. She unintentionally holds her breath when she feels the couch dip right next to her calf; a warm, hesitating hand brings her other calf right against the other, to make room for his other knee, she sees from the corner of her eye. 

 

Once again, despite all of this being at her initiative, and despite her confidence, she can't help but hide her face behind her arm and blush furiously, when he slowly uncovers her backside, the cool air hitting her hot skin -and even more so whenshe hears him suck in a breath. 

 

Then, as if testing the water, maybe unsure of what he's allowed or not to do, he slowly runs the same timid hand over her cheeks, ending his caress with a light squeeze, causing a first flash of heat to travel her core as she tries to arch her back even more, her lips swollen and exposed to him with the rest, the cream melting and rolling down. 

 

Finally, he bends, and she feels a first kiss at the top of her thigh, followed by a shy lick and another wet kiss where her thigh and her ass meet -almost at her center, so close to where she needs him. Her whole body seems to go taut and slack at the same time, and she hums encouragingly. When his hands spread her, she lowers herself completely, on her front, her heart growing louder in her chest. 

 

Without too much transition, his tongue draws a wide stripe between her cheeks, over her tight hole, and she gasps, then holds another gasp when his mouth gets bolder and gives her skin there a good, sloppy suck. She feels his face shamelessly nuzzle her ass; he starts to earnestly lick and suck her clean. Her eyes slid shut.

 

" _That's it_ ," she hisses, breathless. "...mmnnnice..."

 

She struggles not to jolt or press her ass back in his face as his enthusiasm increases steadily, the sound of his kisses and his sucking becoming lewd. In no time, and despite the lack of method, she's squirming, mouthing at the cushion, her neglected cunt throbbing with need and envy.

 

Her hands squeeze the cushion tight, and she pants incoherent praises at him that he probably doesn't register: " _Good boy... sweet, sweet boy... so soft..._ "

 

When she can no longer take it, she braces herself on her elbows and twists to lie on her back, pausing at the obscene sight before her as he sits back on his heels. His eyes are truly those of a cat, black as can be, and his hair falls across them; his cheeks, mouth and nose are shiny with remnants of melted cream. 

 

His vision narrows to the pink, tight flesh she shows him when she spreads her knees as wide as she can, proud and impatient, her pussy begging to be shown the same attention. 

 

" _Here_ ," she taps right above her clit, "here, baby. Kiss it. Be nice to it."

 

His eyes drift shut when his mouth gives her clit a first, generous, lazy roll of his tongue, his jaw then opening wide to suck on her folds. 

 

Once more, she tries not to jerk her hips too suddenly, sucking on her lip, struggling to keep her eyes open on him. She relishes petting him with slow, controlled movements of her hand, pushing his hair away tenderly -cooing at him that he's messy.

 

Seeming drunk on her cunt, he becomes less greedy, and takes his time peeling her lips open, rolling her clit with the tip of his tongue, or licking her lovingly -just like a cat would another pussy.

 

She catches glimpses of his tongue, and once or twice she finds it white with thick cream. She doesn't even care about a method; the sole image of his intimidating form bent in half, suckling at her flesh with bruised lips would be enough to bring her to the edge in no time; but ultimately, what undoes her is when he suddenly decides to press his mouth down on her to nuzzle her and rub his face adoringly in her cunt. 

 

She cries out, her chest heaving and her back leaving the couch -her hand soon sliding between her and him to stop him.  

 

He sits back, his breath short and his fists clenched tight, a few strands of hair sticking to his cheekbones. He's still kneeling on the couch when she sits up and approaches him on her knees, looking up at him -then down at his cock. 

 

High on the orgasm she just had, she has the strange impulse to caress it through the fabric  _with the back of her knuckles,_  like she would a small animal, shushing it. " _Poor thing_ ," she tuts.

 

He holds his breath, his chin in as he looks down at it with her, pupils still blown, his cheeks flushed and lips swollen. His hand grips the cushion.

 

"Should I leave it alone, or would you like me to keep it warm?" She asks with a pout. 

 

" _Keep it warm_ ," he chokes, although she suspects it's unclear to him what it means -he's just certain he doesn't want her to  _leave it alone._

 

"...I don't know... should I? Is it reasonable?" she cruelly asks again. 

 

She lost him. He looks down at her, his face pink, sweating, swallowing, searching for words. So she tenderly kisses his mouth, once, twice, reassuring him. 

 

"Sit back."

 

When he does, she straddles his lap, careful not to touch him. She's certain that he'll come in her hand the second she wraps it around him. 

 

"Here, baby, hold this," she tells him, lifting his sweatshirt up his stomach. 

 

She then slowly peels down his boxer briefs, as if to carefully examine a wound. She might as well be. His cock twitches in agony at this point. She had an idea of his size already but it's another thing to actually see it. 

 

With the most serious face, she looks straight in his eyes and solemnly tells him, the way a bride would say her vows: 

 

"Your cock is the loveliest I've ever seen."

 

" _Thanks_ ," he rasps, squirming under her. 

 

"Mind if I take a seat?"

 

"No?"

 

Again, he doesn't quite get her meaning just then -but he does when she delicately takes him and places him at her entrance, expecting him to come at any moment. He buries his face in her collarbone, holding her waist tight. Slowly, she sinks on it, with gentle rolls of her hips, her face and her core growing warm again. He huffs against her, panting harshly. Soon, he's all the way inside, and she sighs like she would after a long day at work. She stops moving entirely, making sure she doesn't clench around him. 

 

As if her only role was to sit on him like a mamma bird on her nestling. 

 

 _Miraculously_ , he doesn't come.

 

"Better?"

 

A strangled sound. 

 

"Baby? You there?" 

 

"Ugh... yes." 

 

"Feels good?" 

 

"Yes," he hisses. 

 

He leans back against the couch, his brows creased, mouth parted, eyes practically watering, and she takes pity on him, pushing his hair back. She hums, and kisses his temple, his forehead, his mouth. His lips timidly press back, feverish.

 

"...what do you say I bounce on that pretty cock," she whispers on his mouth, fully intending to pump him dry with a few jerks of her hips.

 

He's defenceless anyway. She can do what she wants of him. 

 

Less than a minute later, her cunt greedily squeezes every drop of come he has to give her while he groans and trembles, his eyes screwed shut. Her mouth fall open with a smile, her hips rolling through it.  

  
She lets him catch his breath against her. After a while, to use his words, she confesses to him without thinking twice about it:

 

"I don't always feel sexy. But you make me feel very sexy."

 

"I know what you mean," he mumbles in her neck, causing her to smile until she hears him continue. 

 

"---sometimes I feel like I'm human.

 

But I'm not. Not really."

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [I know you've suffered / But I don't want you to hide / It's cold and loveless / I won't let you be denied](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8OOWcsFj0U)
> 
>  
> 
> okay people some major angst is coming our way 
> 
> be ready


	18. The No Pants lifestyle is over

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is for Kate (bless-my-circuits), for no particular reason other than the fact that I haven't thanked her enough for all the support she's given me. THANK YOU, I hope you enjoy reading it.
> 
> It's been a long time, but the chapter is extra long. Please forgive me.

 

Rey must have needed that to actually think straight. There are only four days left to get Benjamin ready for Saturday, when he'll meet her closest friends. The only friends she has, really. 

 

What the fuck was she thinking? 

 

She's still sitting on him when she comes back to her senses. The amount of gratification he's got from her is nothing next to what she received on that couch, yet he looks like he left his body, saw God and came back, now ready to nap right there for twelve hours straight, his cock happily tucked in her cunt, his face pink and his mouth sated. 

 

It hits her all the more as she pushes on her knees so he can slip out of her. Her thighs shake as she stands up and stares, reality a brick wall she just  _had_  to run into eventually. Suddenly left with nothing to look at and to think about but the mess she's just made. 

 

She gets her overcooked tart out of the oven, and leaves it on the counter. She's got no appetite, and she needs to clean herself. 

 

Because the shower is a merciless place, she ponders on the situation all the more in there, and is really close to spiral by the end of it.

 

They're gonna have to talk about this. Or rather, she's gonna have to educate and train him for Saturday. Hard. 

 

When she gets out, however, she can tell that he's somewhere else completely, high, disoriented, with a single goal in mind: drown her in his affection the rest of the day.   

 

He holds her, enjoying the inevitable shift that has occurred when she decided to let him put his mouth on all the right places she could think of. He welcomes the happy change by kissing her cheeks, her mouth, or giving from time to time a friendly squeeze to her ass or her tits, as if it comes to him like breathing now; her small gasps and stutters in her belly mix with a rising, sneaky anxiety. She doesn't talk to him just yet, trying to first organize her thoughts. 

 

For instance, she has to buy him pants that are not  _sweatpants_ , pants that he could wear outside of the apartment, even if she doubts it'll ever happen at this point. She shouldn't think too much about that now, though, or she'll risk spiraling again. All she knows is, he can't wear sweatpants on Saturday. 

 

When he's done with the dishes, after lunch, he takes a wet cloth with him to wipe the couch clean. She's sitting at the kitchen table, lost in thoughts. When he's back, he wordlessly and awkwardly maneuvers her to bend her over his shoulder, displacing her from the kitchen to the couch again. He drops her there, then turns the T.V. on and lies down against her.

 

When he's settled, she distractedly informs him: "The No Pants lifestyle is over."

 

He grunts in her neck. His arm tightens around her middle.

 

And indeed, the next day, she comes home with three pairs of pants. The gesture is a bit desperate. One could have been enough, at the moment, but she still bought more. Basic, regular, navy blue slacks, made of cotton. She made sure not to get him jeans as she knows that he would hate those, more so than any other type of fabric. 

 

At work, she doesn't think about anything else. She counts on the wine and the beer on Saturday to help her friends better acclimate to him, so his behavior can appear as no more bizarre than a European's. However, she has the intention to stay sober herself, and to make sure Benjamin stays sober too; she's sure he would hate the taste of alcohol anyway. 

 

Her words of advice and requests about Saturday come at all time, out of nowhere, in the middle of the silly conversations he and her often have, and he silently takes note of them. She's not mistaking his compliance for enthusiasm, but she'll do with what she has. 

 

They agree that if anyone asks a question they haven't anticipated, she'll do most of the talking. She's not too worried about that though; if he behaves with them like he does with her, he'll do most of the listening. 

 

He cuddles her tirelessly; she shivers and hums, but she's not quite there. Her mind goes over every detail, anxious that she might have overlooked something. 

 

She sits him down that night, under the kitchen's light, and stands before him, pursing her lips, her eyes drifting over his face and his frame with a seriousness that makes him squirm a bit. She stares, burdened with the difficult mission of giving him an age, in case someone asks him. 

 

He stays quiet, looking up at her. How old is he? How old does he look like? ...Thirty-one? Thirty-two?

 

But then, she tucks his hair behind his ears, and cocks her head. ...Twenty-six?

 

Because she doesn't want to add unnecessary lies to the bunch of made-up details her and Benjamin are going to have to agree on already, other things have to be considered: her friends, people who have very normal lives, who have careers, children, and a mortgage, will see him differently then she does. He's a man who moved in with her, in the apartment she was already living in; a man who doesn't have a job, who doesn't have the wealth to make up for it. 

 

Depending on what he'll say, if he talks enough for them to form an opinion on his level of maturity, they'll probably view him as a rather  _innocent_  person, one who seems to have a hippie-like lifestyle, given how naked he was when Armitage met him.  

 

So to not aggravate his case, she decides that she won't age him more than is necessary. "You're twenty-eight. Okay?" He nods once. 

 

"Born in 1991," she says again, reaching to absently run her nails in his hair. He nods again. 

 

She stays quiet for a moment, thinking that presenting him like an orphan could raise more curiosity than not. "You grew up here. In this town." Again, she waits for him to hum his agreement before stepping between his legs, keeping him relaxed and attentive with her hands in his hair: "You have a mother, but you don't know your father. I think they won't touch it if you tell them that. Should it come up." 

 

They'll have to choose a name for his mother, she thinks distractedly, which leads her to realize that  _he_  doesn't have one to begin with.  "They shouldn't ask, but we need to pick a family name for you just in case."

 

"Kardashian."

 

"No. It's a firm no."

 

"Brontë."

 

"No."

 

"Why not?"

 

"It's too obvious, those are famous names."

 

"Why not give my real family name, then?"

 

Her hand freezes in his hair. She looks down at him, unsure she heard him right. "What?"

 

"My real family name," he repeats easily, oblivious.

 

She opens her mouth soundlessly, frowning, then shakes her head to simply ask: "...What is it?"

 

"Soloway."

 

She stares dumbly at him. He dumbly stares back.  

 

... _Soloway?_   Such a... regular, boring name for someone who's anything but. "...Benjamin Soloway," she murmurs, trying out the words. 

 

He hums. 

 

"Why didn't you tell me?"

 

His eyes widen slightly, as if catching up on the pertinence of the information -the pet who's set to always please and behave in him joins the conversation. "I--I didn't think.. it was important."

 

She leaves the kitchen, and is back twenty seconds later with her laptop to sit next to him. Without thinking, she opens it and types  _Soloway_ in Google. It's a pretty stupid impulse, unless she wanted to check if he's the only  _Soloway_  on the planet, which he isn't. He looks at her do with a mild interest, just like when he follows the steps of her cooking.

 

He's said to her already that he doesn't remember his parents, or their names, or where exactly he comes from. On Facebook, she finds a few  _Benjamin Soloways,_ men younger and older than him, who've had a chance at a normal life, who have jobs, social lives, hobbies; men who don't spend their days cleaning the apartment of an assistant manager in retail.

 

And it occurs to her suddenly that, if someone was looking for him, they could maybe find him this way? If she created a profile on there? She hardly can send a message to each and every Soloway on earth asking them if a little boy in their family went missing. 

 

A little boy who can turn into a cat. 

 

In the middle of actually doing it, creating him a profile while he quietly watches, she realizes that she never took a picture of him. The implication of that hits her hard. If he were to disappear, something she cannot think about without triggering a panic attack, there would be no trace left of him here. None at all. Soon, she would start to forget his face. 

 

Her phone is out, and while his eyes are momentarily on the screen of her laptop, she takes a few photos of him in a row, standing in front of him. He looks up at the sound, but she's already checking the result. This is not the best lighting, but without a flash, it gives the pictures a slight texture that is rather okay, and his expression is somewhat wistful. 

 

Without a word, she moves to sit on his lap. His arms instinctively close around her waist. She holds the phone up to get the best angle, and they both appear on the screen. Seeing himself, he frowns for a second, but he doesn't seem lost as to what's happening. The phone ends up right between them and the light, the shadow of her arm barring her face, and she huffs and squirms trying to find another angle until she holds the phone with her other hand, except that the light isn't facing them anymore and-

 

"I have longer arms," he just states, taking the phone from her. He holds it up, eyes narrowed with focus as he takes the first picture. 

 

"Take several. Take many," she tells him, watching as his face relax more and more with each picture he takes. 

 

He's smiling by the end of it, and by the looks of it, she's been beaming too at times without even realizing it, reacting to his own reaction at the experience. He's still smiling when he asks her: "Why are we taking pictures?"

 

"To post them on your Facebook account."

 

"Oh, okay."

 

She knows that he has an idea what Facebook is. She's mentioned it a few times while gossiping about work, and about things that have happened on the private group her colleagues created on the site.

 

He still has a faint smile on his face as he watches what's happening on the screen, visibly amused: "Why did you create a Facebook account?" he asks, looking right at her. 

 

"So your family can find you, if they're looking for you."

 

His smile vanishes, and she sees it happen. She pauses, confused: "Benjamin?"

 

But he's struck, his eyes not leaving her, trying to process what she just said. His arms get slightly loose around her. When he remains silent, she turns the screen a bit more toward him: "Look."

 

He does look. His eyes slowly survey the page, but his face is completely shut off. Even as the picture of them both smiling up at the camera appears. "...Baby?" she prompts timidly. 

 

He swallows with difficulty, staring at the image in front of him. His voice is very quiet when he does speak:

 

"Why... does it matter to you... that they find me?"

 

The question baffles her, and it doesn't enlighten her on what the problem is, so she asks: "...wouldn't  _you_  want them to find you?" 

 

First there's no reaction, until he gives her the faintest shrug. "I don't care," he mutters. 

 

"You don't?"

 

"I thought..." he starts, and it doesn't seem like he'll say more at first, until he looks at her again, wary, cautious, and just says: "I don't really care about having anyone but you."

 

She closes her mouth, and turns her attention back on the screen. His arms tighten again around her. Eventually though, she hears herself stammer a bit. 

 

"But, I--- your real family is important."

 

When her eyes are on him, he stares right back. They just look at each other, the words hanging, useless. He seems defeated; and when he finally speaks again, it's only to murmur them back at her. 

 

"My real family."

 

"Yes."

 

A moment later, when she's up and drying the dishes, she hears him type something on the keyboard behind her. Peering above his shoulder, she catches a single word in the search bar, the name  _Mazvita_ , a long list of  _Mazvitas_ from across the world unfolding as he scrolls down the results. 

 

He wordlessly closes the laptop after one minute. Then he leaves the kitchen to go to the living-room. Any other night, they normally would already be watching T.V.

 

Yet, the apartment remains as silent as ever. She doesn't hear him turn the T.V. on, and when she doesn't hear him lie on the couch either, she turns around to see what he's doing. But she sees no one.

 

The light of the bathroom is off, and no light comes from the hallway, or the bedroom. 

 

Her bare feet hurry across the wooden floor to the living-room, her eyes already searching down. And she finds him in no time. 

 

He's there, lying face down on the carpet, in his human form; his large body taking all the space between the coffee table and the couch. 

 

She lets out a relieved, quiet sigh.  

 

Cautiously, she approaches him, and when she stands right in front of him, he eyes her feet. He lifts up his head -and plants a chaste, demure kiss on top of the right one. Curiously, she doesn't have the reflex to step away. Not even when he very briefly rubs his nose and his cheek there, making her toes flex. He then turns his head and rests it down on the carpet again. 

 

To make sure he has some understanding of what behaviors are better kept private, she softly says: "Don't do that in front of the others on Saturday."

 

There's a short silence, before he gives her a faint, resigned hum.

 

The rest of the night is uneventful. The next day, however, she comes home around eight PM to a  _very_  agitated version of the man she left in the morning. 

 

As soon as the door opens he jumps on her, and smacks her on the mouth with a rushed and loud  _how was your day._  But then, he immediately  _runs_  to the other side of the apartment without waiting for an answer. 

 

"I... fine," she says to no one, stunned, just as he bolts right back out of the bedroom, his arm ramming into the door on the way. His legs carry him to the very end of the hallway behind her, to the front door. He slides across the floor until he can push himself off the wall. Then he sprints back in the opposite direction, to the bedroom.

 

The apartment is too small for him to reach his maximum speed. The second he's properly sprinting he must slow down and turn around. She finds herself unable to move for a moment, and just stands there watching him through the door frame as he hops on the bed to get on the other side. A cat sprinting across a wooden floor will never be quite as striking -and stress inducing- as a 160 pound man doing the same. 

 

Finally he walks out, shaking, out of breath, eyes down, trying to act as if nothing was out of the ordinary. "What--what is, what are we eating for dinner," he stammers, crossing the room to her in a few strides.  

 

She lets her bag down and hangs her coat.

 

He shifts from one foot to the other, not quite able to meet her eyes, bouncing on his feet.

 

"What's going on," she murmurs as if to herself.

 

"Nothing!" He assures her with poorly acted nonchalance, fidgeting. He huffs, seemingly trying to get rid of what appears to be a good extra amount of... energy?

 

He jumps up and down again despite himself, his face sweaty. 

 

However innocent, her suggestion then just makes everything worse: "See, I wouldn't mind making you a key. This way you could go out for a proper run..." is all she can say before he shouts, cutting her off and making her jump, his eyes wide with terror: 

 

"No! I don't want to go outside --- _I don't want to go outside!_  Are you going to shove me in a bag, throw me in a river,  _is that it?_ "

 

She stands back, blinking. A small, dazed  _what_  falls from her lips. 

 

Seeming to realize his brutal change of tone, he pinches his eyes shut, trying to contain it all in, bottling it inside the best he can, then presses the heels of his hands to his eyes, as if to stop whatever images are intruding behind the lids.

 

She shouldn't be surprised that he doesn't want to leave the apartment; and the mention of a  _river_  doesn't make any sense. What confuses her the most, though, is that he thinks she wouldn't let him back inside. 

 

There's no way for her to determine by his tone if he's trying to be harsh, sarcastic -although it would be a first- or if this is a genuine fear of his. For that reason, she stands there with her mouth opening several times, but unable to say a word. 

 

He doesn't get any calmer, but he does speak lower then. "I'm sorry. Please, please,  _pleaseplease_  don't throw me out."

 

"I --"

 

"I'm sorry. I won't --ever-- run again, I'm sorry." But then, he repeats it like it's beyond his control: "...are you throwing me out? "

 

"...what bag?" She asks no one. She gets closer to him and reaches up, pushing his hair out of his eyes, wiping the sweat off his forehead as he tries to huff out the tension in his stomach, his head bowed. "You can't fit in any bag," she says stupidly. He's still avoiding her eyes. "What do you mean, throw you out?" she asks again.

 

She feels it stand between them before he speaks, his fear that he's done something irreparable, that he's disappointed her. "Forget it. Forget that. Forget what I did, forget I said anything," he whispers in a rush. 

 

Her hands gently pulls his head back, to get him to look back at her. She hates walking away from the progress they made, yet she still hears herself wonder out loud:"...Should I cancel for Saturday?" 

 

Her discouragement at the idea must be written all over her face, because he tries to forcefully bring things back to normal, straightening up -again, in an effort to act like nothing happened. "No! Why?"

 

"Do you feel okay with it?"

 

"Of course!" he says, a bit too loud. 

 

She looks at him for a long time. He's never seemed uncomfortable under her gaze until now. She runs a hand in his hair again. "Go take a shower, clean that sweat off you... I'm gonna make dinner."

 

He complies. She notices that his shower lasts much longer than usual. 

 

When he's back, his hair damp, bringing with him the smell of her shampoo, he doesn't look quite as agitated. She's sitting at the table, waiting for the potatoes and green beans to be ready. She puts her phone away and gets up when he enters, getting closer to him. 

 

She goes to circle his waist with her arms, but he glances at the stove and hurries to say: "Thank you for making me dinner." As if there was a chance she wouldn't. She pauses, confusion crossing her face. "...sure," she says, pulling him to her.

 

He doesn't hold her in return like he usually does; he just seems to be looking for something to say, but she speaks first, creating a diversion: "I've noticed you cleaned the floors again." 

 

He hums in confirmation, but he's not really there. He's still not quite meeting her eyes, still not quite appeased. She slowly runs her hands over his chest in the hope that it'll soothe him, drawing large circles, her hands flat and fingers splayed across his torso; she comments with the softest voice possible: 

 

"That's so... nice. To come home to a clean apartment."

 

He looks down at her, clearly not understanding why she would tell him that, or the rest of what she says then, her nails lightly grazing his chest. "I like that you don't even mention it. I like that you just... do it."

 

"Okay," he grunts, now looking down at her hands briefly, then at her again. He barely even reacts, taking it as a caress like any other, when her hand slides between his legs to tenderly feel him up through his boxer briefs. However, her hand stays there, and resumes its circles over his groin.

 

His breathing becomes gradually more labored, but he doesn't make any comment, just passively takes whatever she gives him. She keeps a regular, steady rhythm and pressure, as if she was only trying to comfort him, and not actively arouse him. 

 

Soon, his hips are canted toward her, giving her the best access he can, his eyes now not leaving her hand. Meanwhile, she feels him growing hotter and fuller through the fabric of his boxers, his blood obediently rushing there to answer the call of her hand. 

                     

Then she stops, turns around, and goes to the stove to pretend like she cares what's going on there, fully aware that the green beans are nowhere near ready yet.

 

She looks down at the water boiling and takes the wooden spoon, although she doesn't have anything to stir or move. But before she can use it, he wordlessly takes it from her to put it down on the counter, where it was. She purses her lips to keep from smiling as he then takes her hand, and brings it back to his cock to get her to resume her petting.                             

 

Much to his frustration, she lets her hand go limp in his hold. 

 

"Rey."

 

"Mmh?"

 

"Rey," he repeats because she still hasn't turned her head to him. 

 

"What?" she asks with the smallest, most innocent sounding voice, her eyes still on the beans.

 

"Do that again."

 

"Do what again?"

 

"What you were doing."

 

She passes a light, lazy hand over his bulge, then withdraws it again, her attention back on the stove. He grunts. Then whines.

 

"Reeeey."

 

He's much more in the present now. His hands find her ass and  _squeeze_ to channel his horniness. "I liked... how you were... rubbing me," he says eloquently.

 

"Sit down."

 

Her tone isn't harsh in the slightest, but he must believe the command means she's fed up. He lets go of her immediately and obeys, sitting down facing her with his hard-on and a sheepish expression. 

 

His brow furrows when she steps closer. She tugs at his sweatshirt. "Take this off."

 

He does, and he's not looking at her when she unties her hair to redo her ponytail, leaving no strand anywhere near her face. He wouldn't understand what it means anyway.

 

He hesitantly hands his sweatshirt to her, and she folds it, then lets it drop between his parting knees to protect  _hers,_  when she'll kneel on it. 

 

And then, she kneels on it. Without a word, but slowly, to not startle him, she places her hands on his thighs and worms her face between them, all the way until she can gently press her nose and mouth against the warm bulge, nuzzling tenderly at his sack through the fabric of his boxers. His stomach clenches  _hard_  at the contact. Her eyes flick up and catch a glimpse of him. He's staring wide at her, frozen but very interested. He's got manners, and he won't interrupt.

 

His panic attack from earlier is a thing of the past. Whatever it was that concerned him, it's well forgotten now. 

 

"Hello," she mouths against his cock, pressing a bit more firmly into his sack, her voice muffled.

 

"Hello," he rasps back at her from above. She can't really tell if he's aware of what's next. The thought of him taking this as just a quirky need she has, to bury her face in his groin, for no reason other than  _just because_ , makes her core burn.

 

She leans back, taking support on her hands behind her. "Take that off too, baby," she commands, her eyes on the boxers. Now  _that's_  unusual to him. She's made it clear many times that she wouldn't allow his nudist lifestyle. 

 

He stands, eager, and pulls them down. His cock snaps against his hip, then bobs, heavy. Red, from the recent shower and from the  _rubbing_. Without needing her to tell him, he sits back down right away, spine straight, expectant. Probably waiting for her to bury her face there again, and just do that. Not that she won't, but that's not all she'll do.  

 

His fists clench tight on each side of his thighs when she takes him in her hand, feeling his weight in her palm. She gives him a few strokes with a lazy wrist, barely acknowledging with a glance the stutter of his chest. 

 

Without further preamble, she leans forward and presses it to her nose, her cheek, her mouth -not kissing it, but rubbing it in, appreciating how hot it feels against her face. A pitiful sound comes from his throat, and he sucks his stomach in, as if to leave his cock and her the space they need to confess each other their feelings.  

 

Once again, she presses her face between his cock and his sack, nuzzling him like he did to her on the couch, and gives each of his balls two chaste kisses, smiling in his skin as she does so when a shiver makes his thigh shake. She then tenderly suckles one, letting her tongue gently push and roll and appreciate the weight; then she gives the second the same attention, unbothered by the lewd sounds that fill her ears. Never before has he kept his thighs as wide as right now; he really doesn't want to inconvenience her, the good boy.

 

"Can I have it in my mouth?" she softly implores, looking up, batting her eyelashes. 

 

"Hhokay," he chokes.

 

She cranes her head back to let him enjoy the view while she bounces the tip on the flat of her tongue, right before she engulfs it. He stops breathing, but she's not worried. She lazily works the head with her tongue, letting herself drool on it so that a few strokes of her hand can get the whole length properly wet. 

 

Finally, she takes him. She dives in to feel him nudge the back of her mouth, then her throat, bobbing once, twice, then slowly draws her lips tight around him all the way back to his tip, pulling on his length with an obscene and drawn-out "Mmmmmmhh--"

 

His cock snaps rigid out of her mouth with a wet pop, and she sucks on her own lips, smacking them as if to savor the taste, then drags it across her face again. She's got a problem.

 

She wriggles her hips to adjust her position when she looks up at him: "Thank you," she mewls at his pink face. 

 

"No problem," he chokes out again, with barely enough air to speak. 

 

His cock stands between them, glistening and proud. She looks at it good before opening wide again. Patiently and tenderly, she pumps him for all he's worth, his fat, heavy cock bobbing in the air when her lips release it each time she needs a pause. It's as if it's got a life of its own, seeking the heat of her mouth, wanting to nestle there. Her cunt gulps as she thinks of stuffing it inside her, but she'd like to make him come like this.

 

She can't tell if he's actually never felt the pass of a pair of lips around him, or if he doesn't remember; either way, the result is the same; his eyes water and roll back each time he desperately tries to keep them on her. His chest heaves, pushing soft, powerless moans out of him. 

 

She gurgles on him until her chin is covered in spit; then she looks up, proudly showing it to him when she sniffled: "I just couldn't wait after dinner, I'm sorry baby."

 

"--t's'okay," he croaks, swallowing hard, his hands now gripping the chair as if his life depends on it. 

 

"You sure?" she asks between two sloppy kisses on his twitching cock. "You don't mind?"

 

 _"Not at all,"_ he insists, gritting out the words, the teasing taking the better of him. 

 

She gives him kitten licks, just to teach him, her tongue lightly lapping at his length, then his balls, and his hips jerk, his face contorts. 

 

But she doesn't really have the patience to be cruel, so she wraps her plump, used lips back around him and pump him with all her heart, humming along his choked moans, slurping and swallowing him like there's no tomorrow.

 

He jerks one last time before she feels his flesh throb hard in the tight case of her mouth. He cries out when the first, thick rope hits the back of her throat, and she lets him slide back out in time to have the rest squirt on her tongue, on her nose and chin. She presses every drop out of him with a friendly hand as he watches, his eyes unfocused and shiny, his mouth hanging open, panting; his chest flushed. 

 

He sits back with a strangled sigh, finally allowing his eyes to close. 

 

She washes her face at the sink. He falls as quiet as a dead man, and he's nearly asleep on his chair when she drops his plate of steamy, simple mashed potatoes and green beans on the table five minutes later, making him jump at the sound. She hands him his sweatshirt as he blinks his eyes open. He obediently puts it on, as well as his boxers.

 

Once he looks down at his plate, and picks his fork up, is when she tells him: " _Bon appétit_ , angel."

 

"Bonapeti," he parrots.  

 

After dinner, he hurries to do the dishes so he can cuddle with her on the couch as soon as possible. Interestingly, the blowjob hasn't  tempered in any way his need for touch, and he moves her around, tucking her against him so he can hold her and snuggle against her  in a way that's nothing less than optimal. 

 

He's definitely more peaceful than he was earlier. 

 

In the bed, later, he arranges her again so that he can press his mouth on one of her breasts for a moment through her t-shirt. By then her eyelids are heavy, and her hand instinctively finds his nape to play with his hair. He goes to kiss goodnight her second breast, breathing it in. However, he also mumbles something into it, his voice low and somewhat muffled: "...Can't get enough of your tits."

 

She slowly inhales, her chest pushing against his mouth, trying to think of something smart to say, but her brain has already given up on being functional for the day. So she just exhales a weak _I know that_ , and closes her eyes.

 

She knows she hasn't turned the lights off, yet it seems impossible for her to make the slightest movement; she doesn't have any energy left to care. She feels herself drift asleep faster than ever -but right before she does, more words make their way to her through the haze:  

 

"Have you had enough of me, yet?"

 

There's a short pause, and her eyes snap open. 

 

" _What?_ "

 

"What?" Benjamin croaks in her breast as he immediately goes tense, stilling completely in guilt. She wonders for a brief moment if she's dreamed it. She buries her fingers in his hair and slowly closes her fists, pulling his head back so she can look right at him. 

 

"...what did you say?" She genuinely asks, her brow furrowed. 

 

He stares into her eyes, wary, and he swallows the words that seem stuck in his throat. After a moment, his face blank and unblinking, a sound comes out of his mouth. 

 

"Meow."

 

Her eyebrows go up. Any other time, she would have snorted. Now, she just stares longer in his eyes, hoping she'll find something there. 

 

Eventually, she just murmurs: 

 

"Are you sure about Saturday, Benjamin?"

 

"I am."

 

Her hands slightly relax in his hair. 

 

"Don't  _meow_  in front of them."

 

"Okay," he mumbles as he lays his head back down on her chest.  

 

 

"Rose should arrive early," she says in the silence of the room. "...so you'll meet her first." 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Just the two of us / We can make it if we try / Just the two of us](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WOuI4OqJfQc)


	19. For personal reasons

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Special apologies to Minstrels, for telling her I'd update this story by the end of the week...three weeks ago, or something?
> 
> I'm truly sorry for the wait, and I really, really appreciated all the comments I received. No, I haven't abandoned the story at all. I understand that it's definitely a different pace for those of you who were used to me updating every day, or every three days. Hopefully you'll still enjoy this extra-long chapter.

It's not until Rey takes a good look at the state of her kitchen, in the middle of the afternoon on that Saturday, that she fully realizes how important that supposed  _casual_  evening between friends really is to her. The amount of food she prepared, and still intends to prepare is indecent. It's way too much food for six people, no matter how hungry they end up being. She doesn't care, though.

 

When she comes home from work, around one, she runs past Benjamin, to the kitchen, and gets to work without even eating. 

 

Two pounds of black  _tapenade_ , two pies, some whole wheat bread she'll have to grill before she can drizzle some olive oil and rub a clove of garlic on it. Several types of cheese, goat cheeses, because Benjamin prefers them -and an army of  _petits fours_. Unfortunately, she's just getting started. 

 

In theory, Rey should have been granted her afternoon off by her manager  _just_ because she asked. She hasn't once been absent in over three years, and she's always been there to replace someone unexpectedly. Because of that she's always the first to be called in anytime someone is sick or someone's kid is; it's been especially true for the past two years or so, since Roy broke up with her, and her life outside of work has been reduced to watching T.V. She has no family left or on the way, so up until recently she had no reason not to go to work early and leave late. 

 

And yet, she has to  _politely insist_  and  _respectfully disagree_  and  _cordially differ_  over the course of several conversations with her manager to get those few hours off. Jared, her colleague who is asked to replace her, looks at her sideways for a whole week for it, but it is worth it if it means she will cook for her friends instead.  

 

There have been very few moments in her life where she could honestly say she felt  _happy_. When she turns around and sees Benjamin wearing the pants and the light blue shirt she bought, she almost blurts it out -then feels stupid for it.

 

Two minutes earlier, she's back in the kitchen and throws his new clothes over the book he's reading at the table, startling him, then goes to resume folding her samosas at the counter. "I don't know how to put them on," he tries behind her.

 

"Funny," she simply says, her eyes not leaving the brik in front of her. 

 

He puts the pants on without any further protest, even if his hands flex a few times at his hips once they're on. He feels the fabric, his thumbs testing the waistband. He's looking down at them, frowning, his mouth in a pout -but he otherwise doesn't say anything, and gingerly sits back down. 

 

Later on, he eyes all the food on the counter, his hands toying with the pages of his book.

 

"How many people are coming again?"

 

When she repeats that only four persons are expected tonight, she doesn't notice how upset he is right away. Eventually, he asks: "...How long are they staying?"

 

So he too thinks it's a lot of food, uh?

 

"They're just coming for the evening." Not the first time she tells him that. 

 

Not everything is going to be entirely fresh-out-of-the-oven, and that bothers her, but fuck it. She only has one oven and two hands.

 

The kitchen is quiet for a while, until she hears the chair move behind her. He comes to stand in the corner, arms at his sides, watching as she does several back and forth between the counter and the fridge; opening it, closing, then opening it again.

 

"Can I help?" he timidly suggests. She has a visceral reaction to it despite herself. 

 

"Oh my god,  _no._ No-thank-you, Benjamin. I don't need anything or anyone slowing me down, I don't even know if I'll have the time to cook everything as is."

 

He tucks his chin in and swallows, standing there, his hands nervously clenching around his book, bending it one way then the other. He's right in the corner of the counter, and she really doesn't need him there. "Why don't you sit down instead?" she prompts him.

 

Wordlessly, he does. 

 

She absently thinks that she should have bought darker pants for him, in case he stains them -even though it's actually unfair to him, because he's overall quite clean, and careful. But she can't help it. 

 

She just really wants tonight to be perfect. 

 

She spent the money for it to be perfect, too. And it's not just the food, or Benjamin's clothes, but also the white rum Finn particularly likes, for instance. She didn't  _have_  to buy it, but she wanted to, and it's expensive as fuck. 

 

For a moment there, she has a small anxiety attack over the possibility that one of them might have become a vegan since she last saw them. Armitage, maybe? She freezes, and looks at all the food on the counter.

 

What if one of them has developed an allergy to gluten -Armitage, probably? She stares at the samosas in her hand. It's just another thought that highlights just how long it's been, and it kinda hurts. 

 

There used to be a time when there was always an occasion to spend the night at Rose's apartment, with Finn, and sometimes Armitage when he was still doing his internship; a time when they'd never miss an opportunity to just sit at the nearest bar, drink and talk. 

 

Life truly is unforgiving for those who don't keep up. Theoretically, she  _understands_  that this is only the natural progression of life. People grow up, people grow apart, and there's not much one can do to keep the inevitable from happening. Against all rational thinking though, Rey still spends a non-negligible amount of her time wondering when she stopped deserving her friends' attention. 

 

She can't help but think that, maybe, if they all had a good time tonight, it wouldn't be too naive of her to hope that they do it again, some time soon? ... or maybe more than once a year? 

 

If tonight made them remember how much fun they can have together just by sitting around and having a few drinks; if she could remind them that they can have interesting conversations together -yes, even with her, the retail worker they left behind -then maybe they would text her from time to time. 

 

Right then, the playlist she put on earlier to make sure she approved of all the songs in it stops, and she recognizes the first few bass notes of  _Sexy Boy_ , by Air. She turns around, blinking. 

 

Benjamin's folded in half on the ground. Her laptop is on the coffee table, and he's sitting legs crossed in front of it, in the living-room. She drops her samosas and hurries to him, stammering: 

 

" _No_  --did you? Did you add that song to the list? We won't listen to that tonight."

 

He looks up at her, hands withdrawing from the keyboard as she crouches next to him, turning the laptop to her. "Why not?"

 

The song stops playing. 

 

"It's not ---a song we can easily talk over. We need acoustic songs, that we can play while talking."

 

"...We can stop talking, when it's on," he softly suggests, watching as she removes  _Sexy Boy_  from the playlist, then scrolls up to find the song that was on before he interrupted it.

 

"But we  _want_  to be able to talk. They're not coming just to listen to music, they can do that at home." 

 

It looks like he's dropping it, but then she hears him mutter: "...what do they have to say, that they'll be talking the whole evening?" 

 

" _You_  don't have to talk at all, if you want," she retorts nonchalantly, bringing the discussion to an abrupt end. 

 

As if to demonstrate, he falls silent.

 

She quickly checks her emails, to see if she received her schedule for the next week, and he stays quiet next to her. She frowns when she finds another email from HR, muttering a low  _what now._

 

She doesn't notice him shift until she feels his nose brushing the skin of her neck behind her ear, making the hair on her arms stand. She hears him quietly inhale, then feels a warm puff on her skin, before he turns his head to bury his mouth in her hair. 

 

"Don't smell my hair in front of the others, tonight."

 

He stills, staying there. Eventually, he slowly leans back. "They don't know I'm your boyfriend?"

 

No official announcement of the sort has been made. Rey would much rather let her friends draw their own conclusion.

 

"Even so, people don't smell each other's hair in front of other people." She sniffs, frowning, then turns to him. "Are you wearing my perfume?"

 

He soundlessly opens his mouth, confused, because of course he's wearing her perfume. There hasn't been a day when he hasn't, ever since she's allowed him to spray some over his clothes. 

 

"...yes," he breathes. "I am."

 

"Nevermind." 

 

The playlist resumes playing, and she feels his eyes on her as she gets up and leaves the room, to go back to her samosas. 

 

The songs play one after the other, without another interruption. 

 

She runs to take a shower around five, thirty minutes before Rose is supposed to arrive. She throws on a thin, blue sweater and a skirt she hasn't worn in a long time, that reaches right under her knee. She then frantically brushes her hair, before freezing. She turns around to the door she of course left ajar. "Benjamin!"

 

He pushes the door open a second later. 

 

She grabs him, and sits him down on the small stool she pulled from the corner to the sink -and as usual, he lets her maneuver him. The stool is so low, his shoulders are barely level with the sink once he's sitting on it. 

 

Without another word, she starts brushing his hair back, with careful yet rapid, efficient movements of her hands. Automatically, his knees part to let her step between them, his arms circle her thighs, and he hides his face in her belly with a sigh. It is quickly done, and she puts down the brush to then run her hands there, to give his hair a more natural look, hearing him muffle a faint groan in her sweater.

 

She leaves before he has the time to bury his mouth in her breasts, but not without giving him the order to put his shoes on, the ones she bought for the occasion. If there's anything he hates more than wearing pants, it's wearing those. 

 

He puts them on in the living-room, and once they're on his feet, he grimaces, then lifts his knees higher than necessary when he takes his next few steps across the room, as if hoping they'll fall off his feet. 

 

"Did you forget how to walk?" She mumbles after a glance at him, trying not to roll her eyes. He doesn't answer. 

 

She isn't done with the food, but at least what she had the time to get ready by five fifteen looks and tastes as perfect as it can. She leaves two sticks of incense to burn, catching sight of Benjamin when he wrinkles his nose at them. 

 

She checks the time every twenty seconds, and when it's almost five thirty, she actually feels her heart beat inexplicably faster. She bounces on the balls of her feet, then goes around the apartment once more, making sure her pink and green light strings are hanging exactly how she wants them on the wall above the T.V., that nothing is left lying on the floor -all while Benjamin is sitting at the kitchen table, watching her. 

 

She shouldn't be so anxious over everything just yet: Rose is the only one to come this early, and there's more to cook before the others arrive around seven; on top of that, if Rose's habits haven't changed, she'll most certainly be late. 

 

Just when Rey sighs, willing herself to calm down, the door buzzes. She jumps, making Benjamin flinch. "It's her!!" 

 

It's five thirty, not a minute later. 

 

It's silly, but she immediately takes Rose's punctuality as a sign that, maybe, she missed Rey as much as Rey missed her. She runs to  unlock the door downstairs, before unlocking her own front door and leaving it ajar. Then, she bounces on her feet again, excitement mixing with anxiety as she waits by the door with a nervous smile and a loud, agitated heart. She hears Rose climb the stairs. 

 

Benjamin is standing a few feet behind, by the kitchen wall.

 

His face is cautiously blank, and when she grins at him, writhing with anticipation, he doesn't return her smile, but he regards her with stunned curiosity, and she can understand why. He's most definitely never seen her like this. 

 

The door is pushed open, and Rose, out-of-breath, appears in the doorway. The next three minutes are a blur. 

 

They both jump up and down, squealing at each other, asking each other how they are without properly answering, swaying in each other's arms; at some point, she thinks Rose says: "Holy shit, I'm out-of-breath --- _what's uuuuuup babyyy?_ "

 

And when the volume of their voices lowers somewhat, Rey suddenly remembers about Benjamin. 

 

She turns around, and finds him right where she left him.

 

He stands more tightly against the wall, his shoulders imperceptibly up, with a very slight wince on his face. 

 

This is really happening.

 

Seeing him in the same room as another person for the first time in months is a whole experience in and of itself. It makes her feel like she's in another dimension, and right then, it nearly doesn't compute. He's fully dressed. He's real. And he's about to interact with a person other than her. 

 

What they have could almost shape itself into a normal, regular life. 

 

Rey approaches him and clears her throat: "Rose, this is Benjamin, Benjamin, this is Rose."

 

He swallows, eyeing the small woman as she lazily waves at him with a big smile, while also taking him in.

 

But just as Rose says: "Yes, Armitage told me ab--", Benjamin bends and dives in. Without further hesitation, he holds her tightly in his arms, almost crushing her the way he sometimes crushes Rey in his hold when she's just back from work, pressing a shocked  _wow_  out of his guest. 

 

Rey watches it happen, unable to utter a single sound. Is that how he's going to welcome everyone tonight? The hug is over before she can think of something to say.

 

Benjamin straightens up, and looks Rose dead in the eye while he announces, categorical:  

 

"I'm her boyfriend."

 

Rey nervously purses her lips, her eyes avoiding Rose's. He then turns around and leaves for the kitchen, letting them both stand there as Rose nods with a breathy: " _Oki doki,_  then."

 

The next five minutes are also sort of a blur. Too much to say, not enough patience. The exchange between her and Rose is a mess. While joining Benjamin in the kitchen, they start twenty conversations at once, eager to tell each other everything yet changing the subject before finishing their sentences.

 

Benjamin sits there, stoic, his hands stiffly on his knees, his eyes going back and forth between the two. Always polite, Rose finally turns to him. 

 

"As I was trying to say earlier, Benjamin, I think you've met Armitage, right?"

 

Benjamin looks wary. "Yes," he simply says. 

 

Rey winces at the awkward silence that follows, but Rose either ignores it or doesn't notice it.

 

She winces  _again_  when she thinks of how  exactly Armitage and Benjamin met. 

 

"Well he'll be here around seven -without the kids, thank God," she says to both him and Rey. "My mother came to spend the week-end, so she has them tonight."

 

Rey is onto the next preparation, breaking a few eggs in a bowl as she encouragingly comments: "Oh, good!" -right when Benjamin bluntly and suddenly recites at Rose a string of random facts about him.

 

"I don't know my father. I never knew him. But I know my mother. She raised me alone. She lives downtown."

 

It takes Rey a few seconds to remember that those are all things she told him to say if he was asked about them. Still facing the counter,  she's powerless once more while he gets them all out, as if to get rid of the lies as soon as possible. Her shoulders tense. She doesn't find anything to say quickly enough to interrupt it.

 

"I grew up here," he finally tells Rose. 

 

"Oh-kay," Rose acquiesces awkwardly, looking for something to reply to that. "I... grew up in Oregon. Both my parents live there." 

 

"Where is that?"

 

"W...where's Oregon?" Rose repeats, to make sure she understood the question. "The state?"

 

"Rose!" Rey practically squeak. "Do you want a drink? Do you want something to drink? A beer? Glass of wine? Cocktail? Lemonade? Water? A glass of water?"

 

She can't stop suggesting liquids at her. Anything to not let that conversation about Oregon go any further. 

 

"Actually I'ma use your bathroom real quick," Rose says, getting up. 

 

Once the bathroom door closes, Rey turns to Benjamin as he comes to stand right next to her. She doesn't stop beating her eggs.

 

"You don't have to tell her anything about you, unless she asks, baby," she whispers. "And even then, you can politely say you'd rather not talk about it...  _if that's okay with you, for personal reasons_ ," she thinks about the not-knowing-his-father part. "The whole point was to dissuade them from asking you questions. So don't act like you want to talk about it, or else why even...?" She shakes her head, before quickly checking the bathroom door. 

 

"Where's Oregon?"

 

"Far from here. Don't ask general questions like that. If there's something you want to know, you can ask me later, when it's just the two of us again."

 

"How do I know if it's a  _general_  question, or a normal question?"

 

"Don't ask questions at all," she says at first, and then realizes how that might come off as rude, depending on the context. "Or I mean... just, no question about geography. Or History."

 

She pours a bit of batter in the pan, letting it spread to the edges as it sizzles. 

 

He's silent for a moment, so she looks up at him. He frowns, and his mouth opens, then closes, hesitant. His adam's apple bobs before he speaks next, in a murmur barely audible. 

 

"...can we cancel?"

 

What.

 

Rey's eyes widen. Her hands still.

 

"But?" is all she can utter at first, before she looks at all the food on the counter, and unexpectedly feels her chest tighten. "We can't---cancel  _now_ , I thought..."

 

Next thing she knows, she feels her lower lip tremble, looking for words. He notices, obviously, and his own eyes widen too. He's seemingly as surprised as her that this is the reaction he gets.

 

She tries to hide it, flipping the crepe, keeping her head low and her lips shut tight but when she speaks again her voice waver, and her throat closes.  She couldn't predict that anything he'd say would have that effect on her, and she's caught off guard by the intensity of what she's feeling. "I thought---I really thought that--" she stammers, then stops before she finishes her sentence with  _I could have this_.

 

"I'm sorry," he hurries to whisper, trying to fix what he's done, his forehead frown in worry. "You're right, we can't cancel now. I'm sorry. I'm sorry I asked."

 

She swallows hard, and he's about to say something else, when the bathroom door opens.

 

Rey shakes her head, trying to regain her composure. Rose is back in the kitchen the next minute.

 

"Need help?"

 

Benjamin wordlessly sits back down, his back stiff. Rey is careful to face away from Rose. "No, I... I'm almost done, just making a few crepes."

 

Thankfully, she calms down pretty easily. Why she had such an immediate response to his words, she doesn't want to find out. 

 

While chatting with Rose, she keeps glancing at Benjamin, and finds that he seems rather okay himself, after a while. He stays quiet, listening to what they're saying with what appears to be actual interest.

 

He gets up and leaves the kitchen at some point, and Rey doesn't pay it any mind at first -but when he doesn't come back she steps away from the counter and leans back to see what he's doing. 

 

He's facing the bathroom door, waiting, his hand flat on it, staring at the handle. 

 

It's closed. 

 

Cursing to herself, she flips a crepe and asks Rose to take care of it for a second, then rushes to open the door for him with a quick  _"here, baby"_ , before Rose thinks of looking their way. 

 

"You'll have to tell me how you met," Rose says, low, when Rey takes the pan back from her hand. "Armie told me he was a one night-stand?"

 

"Uuuh..."

 

"He moved in pretty fast, how did that happen?" She asks again, probably referring to the fact that it took Roy forever to get Rey to live with him. 

 

"He... needed a place to stay," Rey says lamely. 

 

"He's in shape. Gotta respect that," Rose goes on without transition. "I haven't spent an evening without the kids in fucking forever, so thank you.  _You_  made it happen."

 

"My pleasure," Rey sighs with a smile, thankful herself that Rose changed the subject on her own. 

 

A thirty-five minutes long, disorganized update on her three children follows, and Rey makes sure of not interrupting it. Rose's feelings toward her family life are a confusing mishmash of praise and frustration, of resignation and pride. One minute she makes it sound like she really can't take it anymore, like she's really close to giving up; the next she casually says that she  _cannot_  live without her dumb kids and their dumb father. 

 

After detailing the method Armitage and her used to get their now three year old to go on the big girl potty, Benjamin evenly asks: 

 

"Do you love them?"

 

Rose blinks: "Who?"

 

"Your children."

 

Rey nearly burns her hand on the stove. Unfortunately, nothing in Benjamin's expression can be interpreted like he's teasing his guest. It's a serious question, but Rose still chuckles awkwardly in an attempt to turn it into a joke anyway. 

 

"You know, at first I was like," she cocks her head, pursing her lips, " _meeeeh, I don't know_  ----but yeah, they're growing on me, not gonna lie. I might just keep'em." 

 

Benjamin's eyes grow wide, and he looks at Rey. As discreetly as possible, she mouths  _she's jo-king_  at him while Rose checks her phone, almost stage-whispering it. He's looking back at her with a distraught expression that clearly indicates he doesn't find it funny. 

 

"You should keep them," he ends up softly advising.

 

Rose puts her phone down, then  _winks_  at him, popping a  _petit four_  into her mouth. "I'll think about it."

 

Rey represses a sigh, her brow furrowing despite herself when the unsolicited memory of her father leaving her at Grandpa's for the afternoon comes to her.

 

"Do you maybe have a kid yourself?" Rose boldly asks him.

 

"I don't know," he replies honestly. 

 

"He's joking!!" Rey croaks instantly with a panicked smile. "Ha, come on," she says to Benjamin, "stop teasing her."

 

"You have a very deadpan delivery," Rose comments, narrowing her eyes, "I can't say I don't like that. What do you do for a living?" 

 

Rey holds her breath, her hand clenching around the whisk; she waits for his answer as he hesitates, before he softly says:

 

"I'd rather not talk about it, if that's okay with you. For personal reasons." 

 

Better take matter into her own hands at this point. She turns to a very confused Rose. 

 

"He's had ---health problems, he had to quit his job," she improvises, counting on the fact that _health problems_ is vague enough to discourage Rose from asking more questions. 

 

"Oh no," Rose frowns. "Nothing too serious, I hope?"

 

"He's fine, now. Almost completely recovered."

 

Rose doesn't seem to mind that Rey is answering every question for him. She warmly smiles at him. "I'm glad."

 

Again, Benjamin doesn't return her smile. He simply stares at the two, his shoulders tensed. Rey only manages to take the attention away from him by bringing it back on Rose's children, effectively setting off another fifteen minutes long report on motherhood. 

 

Rose interrupts herself when she receives yet another message. She sighs: "Finn will be here around ten."

 

Rey's head snaps up. "What??"

 

Not picking up on her tone, Rose just shrugs. "I dunno, at five he told me he'd be here at eight, then five minutes later he said eight thirty, and now he just sent  _Rosie, you guys start without me, I won't be there before ten._ "

 

"...Won't be there before ten," Rey numbly repeats, her eyes slowly going over all the food on the counter. "His boyfriend is coming at seven, though? Or they're coming together?"

 

"Oh no, his boyfriend's not coming."

 

She doesn't know the man, yet Rey's face falls. "...what do you mean he's not coming?"

 

"That's what Finn told me in his first text."

 

Rey swallows. "Why didn't he send  _me_  anything? I..." She falls silent when Rose shrugs again. Benjamin is watching her, sitting there, without moving an inch. 

 

She turns her back to them, facing the counter and all the food. Slowly, she starts putting some in the fridge. It's okay, she tells herself. Better too much food than not enough. 

 

But that's not the problem, and she knows it.

 

Knowing that Finn has been sharing his life with someone for so long, only serves to remind her of how long they haven't seen each other. She thought she'd catch up tonight by finally meeting that person. And it bothers her that much that she won't, because deep down she's not sure when she'll get another opportunity.

 

She just twists her mouth at the thought, though, and says nothing. 

 

She's still trying to make room in her fridge when she realizes Rose went in the bathroom to argue on the phone. It's already six thirty. 

 

Rose raises her voice, and soon Rey's able to make up what she's saying. 

 

"...you leave that child right where I left her. No. No!..."

 

"...she  _should_  be offended. Are you kidding me?..."

 

"...honest to god, Armitage. I will burn the house down."

 

"... _I am reasonable_."

 

"...can we spend one. Fucking. Night? One night away from them? One???" 

 

It's just a little argument, but after the last fifteen minutes, Rey can't help but feel like she's currently waiting for the building to collapse. Benjamin is on the couch now, just sitting there with his back straight as he has for the past hour, while Rose is shouting on the phone on the other side of the bathroom door.

 

Rey's hands feel weak when she cleans the rest of the dishes. 

 

When Rose is back in the kitchen, she grabs a glass from the cupboard without a word, cracks open the bottle of white rum she finds on the counter and pours herself two ounces.  

 

The signs are piling up. The evening just isn't going to be everything Rey hoped it'd be, anyone with a bit of sense could see that. Yet at that moment, she repeats herself that everything is fine. She badly needs to believe it. She pretends like none of it is happening.

 

And it sort of works, at first. She manages to be blind to the undeniable shift of energy until Armitage arrives, slightly after seven, and even after, as the situation doesn't get better.

 

She pretends like everything's fine when Armitage shows up with Allie, their almost three year old, knowing that what was supposed to be Rose's ideal evening goes right out the window as a result. 

 

She also pretends like everything's fine when Rose and Armitage have another argument about it and whisper-shout at each other for  _twenty whole minutes_  in the hallway, before Armitage has even the time to say  _hello_  to Benjamin -while Allie totters her way to the living-room.

 

"I don't know if you realize how that makes me feel, when you don't respect my decisions..."

 

"I do respect your decisions!"

 

"...or when you don't respect my---  _effing_  mother, Armitage."

 

"I respect your decisions all the time! But when it comes to that particular area, I have a problem, okay? I don't do that because I enjoy fighting with you..."

 

"I need you to make  _effing_  progress on this. I can't take it anymore."

 

At some point, the playlist that was playing at a low volume all this time, comes to an end, and the sudden silence prompt the two parents to leave it at that for now. Rey clearly hears Allie babbling non sense in the living room, but she ignores the child and continues to dry her dishes.

 

Acting like everything's fine. 

 

For some reason, though, it's especially hard to pretend like it's fine when Armitage finally enters the kitchen, and says to her, wincing at the crepes: "Oh, I'll do my best to eat some of that, but I ate something bad at noon, and my body is  _still_  desperately trying to digest it."

 

Rey puts her dishes away, and she just bites the inside of her cheek. She can't find anything to say to that. 

 

Armitage leaves the room anyway, to put his coat, and all of his daughter's stuff in the bedroom, where Rose follows him. Probably to make a very good point she didn't think of during the fight they just had. 

 

All of this, in the end, is nothing next to what happens then.

 

Allie babbles again. 

 

At first, Rey doesn't notice it, because what a toddler says is just background noises to her, so she's not paying attention. 

 

But with the music off, she can clearly hear it. Even from the kitchen. 

 

Her shoulders slowly fall at what exactly Rose and Armitage's daughter is softly squeaking. 

 

"...Meow-meow. Meow meow! Meow?"

 

Rey is not moving at all. Still facing the counter, she breathes in, then out. She can no longer pretend like she feels alright when she finally turns around and sees her. 

 

Allie is on her knees, her forehead touching the floor, bent to look at something that's under the dresser. The little girl changes the intonation of her voice, as if she was having a conversation. 

 

The sleeve of the shirt Rey bought Benjamin the day before sticks out from under the dresser. When Rey takes a few steps closer, her legs numb, she can see the pants she was so stupidly happy to see him wear are on the floor, by the couch. 

 

"Meow? Miaw-miaw?"

 

"Heeeey baby girl, what are you doing?" Armitage coos as he exits the bedroom, Rose on his heels. He bends to pick her up, and just as he does, Benjamin bolts out of his hiding place, his ears flat and his tail down. 

 

"Oooooh, a cat!"

 

"A cat? Where?" Rose frowns.

 

"Look Allie! Looklooklook! ---Jones, I didn't know you had one?"

 

 _There's a lot of things you don't know_ , she wants to say. Instead, she watches as Benjamin comes to a sheepish stop behind her calves, sheltering himself with her. When she looks down at him, defeated, he barely dares to look back at her, and makes himself small, his head low... visibly ashamed.

 

Rey feels so discouraged, that having to justify Benjamin's absence when Rose will remark on it -probably very soon- doesn't even preoccupy her. She doesn't hurry to hide the clothes either. 

 

For a moment she just stands there, her fists slowly flexing as if to feel her fingers again. Armitage is quickly approaching, knees bent, with Allie still in his arms, while Benjamin does all he can to become one with the back of her calves, hiding behind them. 

 

"Look, babygirl --what's his name?"

 

"I... just call him  _baby_."

 

Armitage lets Allie stand on her two feet again, and points at Benjamin. He's repeating  _kitty_  several times to his daughter to get her to say it, while Benjamin stops moving completely and stays right against Rey, his eyes black. Rey just watches the scene, unable to soften at the sight of Allie staring with wonder at her pet.

 

"It doesn't look too young," Rose stays a few steps away. "Where d'you get it? Is it a rescue?"

 

Rey doesn't have the time to reply.

 

Armitage extends his hand closer, and before she can react, Benjamin claws him.

 

However, it doesn't stop there, because right as Armitage takes his hand back with a hiss -while his daughter, shocked, staggers back too- Rey opens her mouth wide without a sound, eyes shut tight from the pain: Benjamin accidentally planted one of his claw in her ankle. 

 

Panicked, her pet repeatedly and awkwardly pulls on it to try to dislodge it, but it only serves to deepen the cut and get the claw more firmly stuck in her flesh -until she bends, teeth clenched, to get the claw out and free them both.

 

In the confusion, Rey's dimly aware that Rose pulls her daughter away from Benjamin. Armitage is still hissing, looking at his bleeding hand.

 

Rey can come up with several excuses for what she does next. 

 

Benjamin is clearly not at ease surrounded by them all. She also doesn't want any unwanted attention on him, meaning she doesn't want to answer any questions about him, specifically questions she'll have to answer with a lie. Furthermore, in the light of what just happened, she really doesn't want to manage his presence among her guests. 

 

But if she's honest with herself, the simple truth is she just snaps. And she wants him out of her sight. 

 

So without a second thought, she grabs him firmly around the chest. He tenses in her hold, his back legs stiffly swinging under him while she crosses the distance to the storage-room.

 

She pushes the door open. Drops him inside.

 

Then slams the door shut.

 

Without a word to her guests, who are already at the bathroom's sink to rinse Armitage's cut, she returns to the kitchen to take out the  _petits fours_  no one will eat. There, she forces herself to ignore how her eyes burn, and the blood running down her ankle.

 

 

No sound comes from behind the storage room's door. No paw is scratching at the wood. 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [And everyone says that I'm the upsetter / But I'm alone and I'm so in love / I've got it bad / And now this heart beats black / You really giving me a hard time tonight / You really giving me a hard time tonight / Why you giving me a hard time tonight?](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=siHQVEStDlg)


	20. The result is the same anyway

The Tico family is in the bathroom. Rey can hear them from the kitchen, washing Armie's  _wound_. 

 

"It doesn't hurt, sweetie," Armie assures his daughter, who must be whining softly at the sight of his blood. 

 

Weak tremors are still coursing through Rey's fingers as she tries to unpack the  _petits fours_  she cooked three hours earlier as delicately as possible. She had thought or a particular plate to us, and of aligning them a particular way; right now she can't remember what those were, or why she cared.

 

Rose, Armie and their daughter are back in the kitchen then, the parents trying to exchange two coherent words while the child keeps interrupting them to squeak out everything she sees that she can name.

 

"That smells delicious, Rey," Rose tells her. 

 

"I don't know if it is, haven't tasted any of it yet," Rey murmurs back, probably too low to be heard. Rose's attention is back on her daughter anyway.

 

Earlier, neither of her two friends remark on her picking up Benjamin's pants near the couch, or his shirt from under the dresser, right before the three of them disappear in the bathroom. The clothes Benjamin left behind after transforming weren't exactly in plain sight, but anyone attentive would have noticed them.

 

As it turns out, Rose and Armie aren't too attentive to anything that happens outside of their little family, especially after one of them starts bleeding all over Rey's wooden floor.

 

Her own ankle bleed and throb too, then, but she just keeps her head down and folds Benjamin's clothes, her hands subtly shaking after she closed the door on him.

 

No, the Ticos don't particularly notice anything compromising, and the most evident sign of their inattention is that it takes Rose  _thirty minutes total_  to realize Benjamin is gone.

 

When she does realize it, she clasps Rey's shoulder: "Where's Benjamin?!" --as if she was the first to notice his absence.

 

Rey can't help her furtive glance at the storage room door. Her chest tightens, however she thinks she manages not to let that show. She swallows, then offers that "He left," with a remarkably flat tone. "...when you were in the bedroom."

 

She should put more effort into her lies, she thinks then -but they'll believe her either way, won't they? It's not like there's any chance they'll suspect her boyfriend turned into a cat.

 

"Oh, why??" Rose exclaims, understandably.

 

"He wasn't feeling good. He... he apologizes."

 

" _I_  wasn't feeling good," Armitage interrupts. "I had food poisoning at lunch. I still came." 

 

"That's what my mother said to me on our wedding day," his wife casually retort -while Rey simply takes a generous sip of the alcohol she swore she wouldn't drink tonight. 

 

Armitage's eyebrows go up. " _Uum_ , can we focus on Rey, please?"

 

"Is it related to the health problems you mentioned?"

 

It takes Rey a second to realize Rose is talking to her. "What?" She frowns, as if she was waking up from an accidental nap. "What health problems?"

 

"You said he had to quit his job, because of--"

 

"Right.  _Right_. Yes," she nods weakly. "Well it's---part of it."

 

Hard to keep up with all the bullshit she's said in the span of two hours.

  

She intended to put the samosas a bit in the oven, or throw them in a pan, to reheat them. Once they're place on her plates, though, she grabs them and leaves the kitchen without a word. She sits on the couch, trusting that the others will follow her. And if they don't, well. She doesn't really care anymore.

 

But they do. Soon, they're circling the coffee table -her alone on the couch, Rose and Armie facing each other on the two old chairs Rey pulled from the corners of her apartment.

 

She wonders if Benjamin would have sat on the carpet, like he often does -then quickly swallows that image down.

 

Credit must be given to her. For a few moments, she manages to act a minimum as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened. She sits there, and absently asks her friends mundane questions about what has happened in their lives since she last saw them -mainly to make sure she doesn't have to answer any questions herself.

 

This task proves more difficult to execute in her state than it should be -although not as much as when a faint, faint sound makes its way to her ears from across the room. 

 

It's a very characteristic sound, that she would recognize anytime, anywhere. It's hesitant, done with one paw, maybe. Timid claws scratching at a door.

 

He must hear how closer to him their voices sound, now. He must be wondering why she hasn't opened to him yet.

 

She resists as best she can to turn her eyes to that door, fixing them on Allie -the collar of her dress feeling like it tightens around her neck. Armitage is talking, so she looks at him next. 

 

For a good minute, it works. She tells herself that what she uses as a  _storage room_ , however small a room it is,  _is_  an actual room: a narrow spare bedroom, with a window. And although Benjamin has shown great distrust toward windows, in Rey's eyes, it should be of some consolation that he can see the moon if he wants to.

 

A  _small_  room, Roy insisted on reminding her, that could absolutely become the bedroom of a child; a room she now uses to store all the useless shit from her past to collect the dust instead; all the notebooks, the CDs, the VHS, photos, necklaces, and magazines that Benjamin has grown fond of since he's found them, she suspects partly because everything faintly smells like her.

 

She put him in there for a reason, she reminds herself, before trying to ignore that that reason grows blurrier in her mind with each passing minute. 

 

The sound is gone in an instant, though. Fleeting enough to make her doubt it happened at all. 

 

She hides the frown of her mouth behind her glass again, her own tongue tasting bitter. Not much chance she'll be eating at all tonight. She'll be picking at the skin around her nails instead.

 

She tries to be an active listener to Armitage, but the more she does, the more difficult it is to not reevaluate everything about the present situation. What was the point of this evening again? She doesn't know how she manages to save appearances by doing the bare minimum.

 

The night falls abruptly, and an hour too late she realizes that she forgot to turn her light strings on. It's hard to believe she was actually  _excited_  about having an occasion to use them this afternoon.

 

Every now and then, her eyes goes back to the room she put Benjamin into. Enough times, in fact, that Rose catches her and interrupts Armitage's venting about a colleague at work who keeps parking his car where he's not supposed to.

 

"It's okay, Rey. You can let it out."

 

It feels like being pulled from under water. "...Huh?" Rey stutters, despite having clearly heard and understood the words.

 

"The guilt is  _real._ I can feel it radiating from here. We don't care if that cat in the same room with us."

 

"Well--" Armitage starts to interject, before thinking better of it when his wife glares at him. 

 

"Right," Rey just says. She sits there for a few seconds, processing this new development. Then, on weak legs, she gets up from the couch, tuning out what Rose and Armie are muttering to each other.

 

Once she finds herself facing that door, somehow, it feels like her hand is too heavy to lift. Her heart doesn't beat faster exactly, but stronger. 

 

She sheepishly turns the handle. Slowly.

 

It's dark inside, completely silent. She stays in the doorway for a few long seconds. Rose and Armitage are arguing about something, and although Rey doesn't know what it's about, it doesn't seem as serious as what they were fighting about earlier. Either way, she uses that moment of semi-privacy to call her cat.

 

"Kitty?" She whispers. "Baby?"

 

She turns the lights on and blinks. Her eyes scan the room then -the red plastic chair, the cardboard boxes, the comforter, the piles of books, her old dresser.

 

Benjamin, however, is nowhere to be seen. He's hiding.

 

In a way, that reassures her a bit. It does. Her -sudden- decision to separate him from the others didn't come out of nowhere. He needed it. He doesn't want to get out.

 

And it makes sense that he would hide. He's not hiding from her, she tells herself. He wouldn't want to come out with everyone here. Of course.

 

Even then, she'd like to see him. Assess his state. So she turns the lights off, and leaves the door ajar.

  

When she sits back down, her eyes are on the door, and she glances at it several times after. She's  _not_  worried. She's simply curious to see when he'll get out.

 

Finn arrives earlier than expected, and it momentarily pulls her out of it.

 

She forces a smile on her face when she lets him inside. He hugs her, then explains the reason why he's late at some point, but she busies herself in the kitchen, feeling herself nodding at what he says to trick him into thinking it matters to her.

 

It doesn't matter. The result is the same anyway.

 

"Look what I have," she shows him, pulling out the bottle of white rum Rose opened earlier, that Rey initially bought expressly for Finn.

 

"Ooh," he whistles, impressed, before his mouth twists, "I think I'll pass tonight. Long story. I'm trying to watch my  _alcohol consumption_."

 

Rey weakly puts the bottle back down on the counter, before she pauses, and opens it. "I'm not," she simply comments, pouring herself a drink. 

 

The mood of the evening doesn't drop as low as she expected, all things considered. Her guests chat with each other with the enthusiasm she hoped they'd have. The music is good. The food is good. But her heart isn't in it, and she's barely able to focus on anything they say. She keeps spying the storage room door from the corner of her eye. 

 

Without saying anything, and without anyone remarking on it, she gets up after a while, and disappears in the kitchen. When she timidly opens the storage room door wider, it's with a tea cup full of cream, that she places inside on the floor, in the dark. She waits a moment there, holding her breath to be sure to catch any sound of a book falling, any sign that something is moving in the dark. But nothing happens. And it's perfectly  _fine_.  

 

She returns to the couch. She wouldn't be a very good host if she spent the rest of the night inside that room. So she won't do that, she decides. 

   

Rose is the only one who eats what's on the table with appetite. Rey assumes Finn couldn't wait, earlier in the evening, and that he grabbed something to eat before coming here. Armitage also tries to make his daughter taste a few things, like when he presents a samosa to her. "Want a bite? Allie? Sweetie?" 

 

" _Nah!_ "

 

"Don't force her," Rey murmurs. 

 

After a while, Finn turns to her, and given the look on his face, she knows he's happy to be here, at least. "So! What's new? Tell me everything." She hopes she doesn't look like she's grimacing. "Not much." 

 

He purses his lips, playful: "Oh come on, you can't tell me that!" -and she gets why he'd react that way. It's hard to believe she doesn't have anything to tell him about, it's been so long.

 

It's hardly a lie, though. Aside from the changes Benjamin provoked, her life has remained the same.  

 

She hasn't traveled. She hasn't accomplished anything, learned a new language, or a new skill. She hasn't explored a hidden talent. There's no plan, no career, no family or house to talk about. She has no purpose in life. She is  _right_  where they left her nearly a year ago. No big step has been taken, and there is no big step ahead of her. This is it. 

 

Her glass finds its way to her lips, preventing her from saying any of that depressing shit. 

 

Rey isn't any more special than she was when Finn last saw her. Which reminds her that, because he knows nothing of life, Benjamin has looked at her many times like she's  _truly_  special. She wonders when he'll realize she isn't. 

 

Armie carries Allie to Rey's bedroom after she falls asleep on the couch. Rose pops another  _petit four_  into her mouth, muttering around a mouthful while her husband can't hear her. "He'll go check on her every fifteen minutes. Imagine living like that."

 

Rey doesn't want to imagine. She'd resent "living like that", and she'd also rather not think about the life she has instead. 

However, Finn redirects his attention on her, to her dismay, and asks her with a wink: "New colleagues you want to tell us about?"

 

Regardless of how much time they've spent apart, Finn is used to Rey ranting about newbies she has to train at work, or new managers trying to establish their authority while simultaneously acting like they don't know the first thing about how to manage a team, the budgets, or the schedules. 

 

Unfortunately for Finn, Rey isn't in the mood to revive the good old days, and right now the mere memory of how they used to spend their evenings after work saddens her even more on top of everything else.  

 

"No. No new colleagues. I don't have anything to talk about, just  _drop it_."

 

She half expects Rose to say  _that's not true! She has a new boyfriend now_  -but no. It's just plain awkward silence for a few long moments, except for the folk music playing low in the background. She takes another sip of her drink to give her hands something to do as shame burns her face -less because of her tone, than because of what she said. 

 

 _What about you?_  She's supposed to ask by way of an apology. She doesn't, because she really doesn't want to know, now -however Rose unfortunately asks him, presumably to defuse the tension.  

 

Finn clears his throat: "I'm leaving for Australia in September. It's like, official now. I'll be living there until October next year." 

 

Rey's rum goes down the wrong pipe. She coughs, with tears in her eyes, while Rose gapes at him: "Holy shit ---Finn, that's so great! I'm so happy for you!"

 

"Congrats," Rey rasps. Finn is beaming. 

 

She avoids his eyes. Will she even get a chance to see him again, before he leaves?

 

In her head, she counts the months until September, then adds them to the months he'll be spending out of the country. This time, she's unable to force a smile. She gets up and pretends to have something to do in the kitchen, while Rose drinks to it. Armitage is told the news the second he comes back in the living-room. 

 

Rey has never traveled outside the US, and she's been in three different states total in her entire life. She's always wanted to go to Canada.

 

Listening to the road-trip stories of her friends, at an age where it was more than okay for her to not have gone through the same experiences yet, used to be a painful exercise on many levels, a few years back. She'd swallow down her envy and act as if hearing about what they had learned or seen or discovered didn't remind her of how little she'd seen of the world, of how ignorant she was. 

 

Tonight -at her age- she can't pretend anymore. Not when she's starting to seriously consider the possibility that she'll never get to travel -that she'll never know anything else than the life she has now. 

 

She needs to stand at the counter by herself for a minute.

 

Across the room, the door she opened to let Benjamin out is... open. And there's still no sign of life from inside the room. 

 

She doesn't know how Benjamin and her haven't discussed the possibility of him turning back into a cat tonight. Why she hasn't sat him down before today to come up with a plan, if it were to happen. 

 

She's spent the past  _seven days_  thinking about tonight. Now what?

 

A timid rain has started to fall a few minutes ago. It'd be so lulling to hear it quietly patter against the glass of her bedroom window. To be lying with him in the dark, and not talk. Just hold each other.

 

She bites the inside of her cheek hard to keep her lips from suddenly trembling. A deep breath, and she already feels calmer. It's alright. He's no doubt better where he is now than with them. Shit happens. It's fine. This night will be over eventually. It's his first experience with other people, it'll get better with time.

 

She knows all that. All of this is objectively true, and she can't wait to tell him all that, once they're alone again. That it's alright. It's fine.

 

It's nothing that can't be fixed.

 

So for the rest of the night, Rey anxiously waits for everyone to leave. When they do leave, though, Allie is asleep in Armitage's arms, Finn helped to bring everything back in the kitchen, Rose hugs her with the promise that she'll call, and everything happens really fast.

 

In less than a minute, they're gone -and she's alone in the apartment.

 

Well, not alone.

 

She can't bring herself to immediately go there. She sits on the couch to finish another drink, and it doesn't turn out to be the liquid courage she needs. And why should she need any courage at all? 

 

Her stomach is inexplicably in knots when she turns the music off.  _Inexplicably_ , she thinks again. There's no reason.

  

However low the music was, the silence that surrounds her when she turns it off is as thick as it gets. She'd have hoped that the music coming to a sudden stop, or the front door slamming shut on everyone's voices before that, would have been enough for Benjamin to come out from wherever he's hiding. That she'd hear some movements. But she only hears herself breathe.

 

The light strings weakly flash some blue, green and purple on the wall. Even if it appears to be dark outside, the living-room would get its fair share of moonlight, if she turned all the lights off.

 

A very unsure and quiet "Kitty?" falls from her lips, well before she finds the courage to finally step closer and push the storage room door wider.

 

She doesn't dare turning the light on. So she stands in the doorway, and lets her eyes slowly adapt to the obscurity. The familiar shapes of the cardboard boxes fade in. Gradually, the moonlight softens the darkness for her, and she takes two shy steps inside.

 

"Benjamin?"

 

The tea cup full of cream at her feet has been left untouched.

 

It's dark, but the reason why she doesn't spot him right away, even though he's relatively in plain sight, is because she's still expecting a cat.

 

When she makes out the shape of his shoulders, and finally find his eyes, the hair on her arms slowly stand, and she comes to a complete stop.

 

He's sitting on the floor, his long naked legs bent, his hands flat on the carpet. His back rests against the wall on her left, across the room from her. While his eyes remain on her, his whole body is completely immobile, his face carefully schooled into the most neutral expression she's seen on him yet. It's so unlike him, the sight is more unsettling than anything she could have imagined finding.

 

"...baby?"

 

He keeps his eyes on her, but there's no reaction happening of any kind. He's not moving at all. So she stands there, not knowing what to do with herself, or what to say. He's looking right at her, so he's not exactly ignoring her. Yet nothing comes out of him. He doesn't look angry, or sad. He doesn't look like anything.

 

He does move eventually, though, his eyes finally leaving her. Wordlessly, he bends with very slow movements, until he's crouched, his hands on the floor in front of him, to crawl -then he pauses, unsure. 

 

She's waiting there, sheepishly wiping the palms of her hands on her skirt.

 

His head low, he hesitates some more, until he starts crawling. Just enough to find himself right under the window. His right hand leaves the floor, to reach above his head. His nails find the glass of the window. 

 

Ever so gently, he taps against it, the way he's done before to get her to open a door for him. 

 

There's a single rational conclusion to draw from what she's seeing. He wants her to open the window.

 

Ultimately, one opens a window, here, on the fourth floor of this building, to either air a room, or to throw something through it --unless said window opens on a fire escape that allows people to leave the building in case of an emergency. Like this one does. 

 

That possibility obviously doesn't compute in her mind. 

 

Why would he want to go outside? Now? When she's tried to get him to before, and he's always had panic attacks at the mere suggestion?

 

Is it that he wants to throw something out then? Out of anger? As payback? Her eyes quickly check what's around him that he could grab. There's a bunch of things, many things -nothing of true value except to him. Would it be a kind of statement? 

 

Neither of the two possibilities fit what she knows of him. He wouldn't throw or break something. And he wouldn't leave. 

 

Her fists slowly clench, as tight as her throat gets. 

 

Could he be hiding his anger that well? He's never hidden his true feelings to her. He's never seemed able to.

 

She gets closer, and stops a few feet from him. His eyes are still fixed on the floor in front of him. His hand is still flat against the window. 

 

"...Do you want me to open it for you?" Her voice is so small. She intended to ask that as evenly as possible. 

 

His mouth is hidden behind his arm, and his eyes aren't meeting hers when he nods -almost imperceptibly.  

 

"Why?" 

 

It's a pitiful, miserable sound that she pushes out in the silence between them.

 

But all he does in response, as quietly as she speaks, is tap against the glass a second time. 

 

He doesn't look like he's intending to leave, at least. He seems just as weary as she is -like he can't wait for this day to be over, and to sleep in a warm bed. She takes a deep breath. "You... you're not going outside, right? Baby?" A lump forms in her throat when he doesn't move. "It's night out," she tries to explain. "It...it just rained."

 

As if the night or the rain had any weight at all in the way she's feeling about his request. "Are... Are you trying to go outside?"

 

He's still not looking at her, but slowly, without a word, he shakes his head no, closing his eyes. And because it appears to be every bit as genuine as he's always been with her, she lets her shoulders relax somewhat.

 

"You're staying inside, aren't you?" she asks again. 

 

And again, hesitant, yet distinct, there it is: a nod of his head. The only response to that question that could possibly match everything she knows of him. She resigns herself to it, and reluctantly approaches the window. 

 

She doesn't know why she does it, in the end, other than because he asked -and that she has no reasonable excuse to refuse. The only thing on her mind as her thumbs unlock the bottom panel -before sliding it upward, something that'll likely be hard to do after leaving that window locked for so long- is that she should bring him his clothes. Whatever he intends to do, the temperature is low outside, and if he's to even just sit with his bare body by the open window, he could easily catch a cold. 

 

She doesn't have the time to develop that thought. The second her fingers grip the bottom panel, a gap of an inch or so allowing her to properly do so, two solid, determined hands seize it from her and  _slam_  it open with unnecessary force. 

 

She lets go of it with a choked sound, and loses her balance enough for her to stumble backward. 

 

In the blink of an eye, the long, heavy body that was crouched at her feet unfolds and plunges through the opening. Its resounding and graceless landing on the steel grating of the fire escape makes her flinch, and it takes her a second before any sound comes out of her mouth. 

 

"Benjamin!!"

 

The next instant, the cold hits her: she's went the same way and lands on unsteady legs on the platform - _unsteady_ , because she's craning her neck at the same time, desperately trying to keep track of Benjamin's movements above her as he bolts up the stairs.

 

She can't find any trace left of what she presumed was  _hesitation_  in his body. 

 

_"Wait!!"_

 

If she had any control at all over herself at that moment, as she's running up the stairs, if only to salvage what's left of her dignity or to leave her neighbors out of it, she'd try not to cry after him in alarm. 

 

As things are, she simply panics, and calls his name again. As if he hadn't heard her.

 

As if he wasn't simply  _choosing_  to ignore her. 

 

He disappears on the roof, but she's close behind. She hoists herself up again on the edge of the wall, hearing her dress tear at the seam of her right armpit. She straddles it, panting. He's striding ahead, naked under the moon, without even the sound of a car in the distance to disturb the silence. The sky is heavy with clouds eastwards, but it's clearing up. Not a single light on behind the windows of the nearby buildings, while a few streetlights cast an orange glow from the road. This is the  _roof_ , how far can he go?  

 

"Where are you going!!" She hurries to catch up, then freezes not far from him, when he climbs on the edge of the wall, the one facing the street, then keeps walking on it. Right as she calls him again, hoping to stop him, he suddenly turns around. "Benj--" 

 

What he says to her then, he says it with a pained snarl, spitting each sounds; without stuttering, without thinking -like he's reciting the words. 

 

" _No matter how hard you try, no matter how desperately you want them to love you and accept you, you cannot change them."_ He's shaking, finally shouting: ".... _They're not like us. They have no soul!_ "

 

She goes rigid with confusion, blinking, trying to process the image of him yelling down at her, on top of what he yelled. 

 

"...who?" she simply breathes.

 

It's not so much anger as it is shame and hurt that color his face then, when he concludes: "She  _warned_ me _._ "

 

 _Who did?_  She wants to ask again, before yelling too when he's about to turn back around. "Stop!!!"

 

He halts, his mouth in a hard line. Surprise flashes on his face when he sees her crouched down. Her body demands to be as close to the ground as she can, as if to balance his position, perched on the edge of the roof. He seems entirely unaware of how a single wrong movement could get him to fall on the other side of that wall, and have him meet the ground forty feet below. She can't tell if it's because he forgot his current weight doesn't match the agility he has as a cat, or if he just doesn't care. But she's terrified. 

 

"Please, baby, get down. If you slip---if--you could--" she stammers. Her hands are reaching for him, her fingers flexing in the air to magically take hold of him and pull him to her. She doesn't dare get too close, though, since he seems to only want to get away from her.

 

"Get down from there. I--" She looks for ways to convince him, finding that all she has are words that taste wrong on her tongue: "I won't force you to come back inside, if you don't want to. But get down. It's not safe."

 

Something shifts in him, she's not sure what. It almost seemed like she had his attention for a moment there, and now the hurt on his face comes back tenfold, pressing his lips in a wounded frown. He turns around. The ball of his foot slips on the wet concrete. 

 

He falls without a sound, like the snow falling. One moment he's there, standing tall right in front of her -the next, there's nothing. She screams. 

 

" _No!!!_ " 

 

She throws herself at the wall and leans against it, to look down. 

  

He's  _there_.

 

Gripping tightly at the end of a bent, rusty steel bar sticking out of the concrete wall, seven feet below her. Taunt with terror, his whole body hangs rigid in the empty space beneath him. His shoulders tremble, but he's barely breathing, his ribs stuck. He's as white as a sheet. 

 

His eyes confusedly go from her, to the edge of the wall, to the bar he's clinging to, then back to her, blinking, desperate to find a solution. No move is attempted. There's nothing near him to put a foot on and help him climb back up. He might be able to hoist himself up, but he's too low to reach the edge of the roof. She cannot reach him, and if she could, she wouldn't be able to pull him up. Even with all the adrenaline coursing her body and threatening to cause a cardiac arrest, he's too heavy. 

 

" _Change back_ ," She whispers, her nails painfully digging into the concrete. She whispers it, as if speaking any louder could cause him to let go.

 

It's an idea that isn't digested. It's not a plan. It's just all she has, there's nothing else to try.

 

He grunts, his brows furrowed, looking right at her. The knuckles of his fingers are turning dangerously white. He's losing his grip. 

 

"Turn back into your  _other form_ ," she says more insistently, her neck straining toward him, teeth gritting. "Do it, baby, come on."

 

"I can't," he quietly says -so quietly he's almost mouthing it. He seems to be in the process of fully grasping what his situation entails -and what awaits him.

 

" _Yes_ , you can--" she swears, with somewhat a semblance of control at first, before desperation causes her voice to suddenly rise: "Do it, just  _turn back!_ " 

 

"I can't." 

 

His fingers slip around the bar.

 

He doesn't gasp, or scream, or say another word. 

 

She squeezes her eyes shut.

 

How can this not be as loud as a car crash? A bomb going off? It's a cold, peaceful night all around.

 

He let go. 

 

A violent spasm shakes her core. She can't feel her hands, or her face. It's like all her blood has been drained at once from her body.

 

_"Are you done yelling??"_

Through the blur, she sees a man leaning out of his window, on the fourth floor of the building facing hers. She now can hear herself screaming through the nausea.

 

"Call 911!!!" She begs in response. "Call---"

 

She chokes on her words right as she leans against the edge of the roof again to look back down. 

 

Her eyes search the ground frantically. There is no one there. No body lying on the ground.

 

Only a small, black form. A moving one.

 

"Yeah I'll call 911, alright--- You crazy bitch! It's one in the fucking morning!" The man shouts.

 

Her legs too, she realizes as she rushes to the fire escape, are numb from the shock. But she's running. She runs down the fire escape, so fast that she misses some steps and almost falls.

 

She finds herself on the sidewalk in less than a minute, sprinting under the streetlights. Then, she falters practically right away, and her feet come to a stop.

 

Panting, she looks all around, at the sidewalks, at the road, at the end of the street. There's nothing but silence, and there's no one.

 

No one else but her.

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [There's things I wanna say to you, but I'll just let you live / Like if you hold me without hurting me / You'll be the first who ever did](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DCYmJDO2_IE)
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> Hey fellow babies. I love you, hope you know that. Stay hydrated ❤️

**Author's Note:**

> You guys, I have a [tumblr](https://ao3animal.tumblr.com/) and a [twitter](https://twitter.com/ao3animal)  
> You can find infos there if you're looking for ways to support me
> 
> Say hi =)
> 
> (Also:[Spotify playlist](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6LOwhQeooBiEdcxHva2Y4P) with the songs in the chapters' notes of this fic -enjoy?)


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